Superintendent Debbie Critchfield believes rural communities are highly interested in increasing workforce-ready career technical programs for their students, so she wasn’t surprised by the “sheer demand” of grant applications reaching the Idaho Department of Education.

Thirty-two of 35 proposals went to rural schools, which accounts for a little more than three-fourths of the money awarded so far.

“It’s problem solving. It’s math. It’s science. It’s all of these things captured in work-based learning. I firmly believe that a good, hard day’s work is the answer to a lot of things,” Critchfield said.

During the last legislative session, when lawmakers approved $45 million for Idaho Career Ready Students (ICRS), Critchfield said her critics claimed she’s trying to turn every kid into a welder.

“That was one of the things we heard. If kids don’t want to weld, they still don’t have to. But when I went to Twin Falls High School, I asked the principal to take me to your most popular elective class,” Critchfield recalled. “It was welding.”

She encountered similar stories about career technical education in the farming, food processing, tourism and logging regions.

And applications have poured in. The state has received more in grant requests than it has money to allocate. In the span of four months, approximately $35.9 million of the $45 million ICRS grant money has been set aside for 35 proposal requests. Approximately $111 million was requested, which is 146% more than what they were able to award. About $9.1 million remains unspent.

The Department of Education is administering the program but spending decisions are made by the ICRS council — 11 industry leaders, career technical educators, lawmakers, education leaders and Critchfield.

Grants are intended to create or expand pathways into welding, fabrication, machining, agriculture, forestry, mining, nursing and cyber security. The program incentivizes rural schools to align programs with their community and industry needs. The money should reduce the problem of finding resources needed to sustain high-quality career technical programming.

The high-level of interest is evidence that career technical education is a powerful tool, Critchfield said. “I’m not surprised that our schools are trying to meet career goals for our students. I’m not surprised that there’s more interest in technical programs. I’m not surprised that kids want a jumpstart on their careers.”

But how will the state measure success and provide accountability for the millions promised across Idaho in communities like Middleton and Pocatello, and rural Deary, Malad, Orifino and Wilder? The ICRS council expects school districts to be “good stewards,” submit quarterly reports, a final project completion report and account for spending in district financial reports, according to the state’s website.

The council will consider metrics and evidence to measure success and return on investment at their February meeting. Expanding workforce-ready programs could impact job creation, unemployment, local economic growth, graduation rates, student mental health and career choices.

Districts are required to answer “show us how you’re going to know that this is successful and sustainable” on the the application.

Pocatello-Chubbuck School District’s longtime career technical education instructor Rhonda Naftz was emphatic about the impact in her region: “This is one of the greatest things the state of Idaho has ever offered to students.”

The Idaho Division of Career Technical Education released the following data that demonstrates the growth of high school CTE programs over the last six years.

Where is the ICRS money going?

The ICRS council met three times and committed 79% — or $28.2 million — for 32 rural and remote school district proposals; three proposals were awarded in areas not considered rural.

“It was very clear that we were under-serving local economies,” Critchfield recalled, about her visits around the state. In North Idaho, the forestry, logging and timber industry provided the catalyst “for getting this grant together. I consistently heard about great opportunities for students.”

Four forestry and natural resources proposals received $3.5 million for start-up or expansion of logging and the production of forestry products.

About 65% of all the money awarded ($23.5 million) went to five school districts’ capital projects. The districts receiving the largest awards are: Pocatello-Chubbuck, $6.5 million; Jefferson, $5.3 million; Minidoka, $4.9 million; Blackfoot, $3.9 million; Sugar-Salem, $2.7 million. In total, capital projects received $33.1 million. Existing programs at 13 schools received $391,165. And Potlatch, Firth, Shelley, Orofino and West Bonner districts were approved for new programs, totaling approximately $2.3 million.

“It’s life changing. This grant will change the face of CTE in this whole region,” Naftz said about Pocatello-Chubbuck’s career technical center, which is expected to officially open in 2024.

Hands-on, real-world learning is an answer for students who feel “aimless” or lack “confidence,” Critchfield said. “There is a sense of pride. You develop perseverance and grit.”

Millions were awarded to long- and short-term projects since July but only a small portion has been spent: about $400,000 through requests for reimbursement, a district issued purchase order or vendor invoice to the Department of Education. There is no deadline for when funds are to be spent. Any unused money will be returned to fund proposals not previously accepted.

The ICRS council

The council’s next meeting is Feb. 16. Applications are due by Jan. 31. The council is made up of the following members: 

• Critchfield, who chairs the council.
• Clay Long, administrator, Idaho Division of Career Technical Education.
• Lex Godfrey, secondary CTE instructor, Career Technical Educators of Idaho.
• Brandy Funk, secondary CTE instructor, Career Technical Educators of Idaho.
• Rodney Farrington, associate professor, Career Technical Educators of Idaho.
• Robb Bloem, StanCraft Companies, representing industry.
• Dana Kirkham, Idaho Environmental Coalition, representing industry.
• Angelique Rood, Idaho Power, representing industry.
• Marie Price, Idaho Forest Group, representing the Workforce Development Council.
• Sen. Kevin Cook, Idaho Senate, District 32.
• Rep. Judy Boyle, Idaho House of Representatives, District 9.

“I have just been really just blown away at the level of attention and experience that people” on the council have, Critchfield said.

But rejecting applications is part of the process. Some proposals — particularly those outside the scope of in-demand careers — were rejected outright, but most are placed in the “not yet” category: they will be reconsidered, if money becomes available later.

The council rejected a request for heavy equipment. Additional ineligible expenses include:

• Curriculum for existing programs.
• Instructor travels for professional development, course work and conferences.
• Student travel for general field trips and extra-curricular activities (specific, itemized requests for travel may be considered).
• Soft costs associated with building programming and construction — contractor administration and overhead fees and building permits (architectural and design fees, and contingency fees are allowable expenses).

School districts and charters can apply for the funds here. The ICRS program was approved by the Legislature earlier this year and signed into law by Gov. Brad Little on March 31. Questions can be directed to program coordinator Allison Duman at aduman@sde.idaho.gov.

Pocatello-Chubbuck to offer a regional CTE center

The council awarded the Portneuf Valley Technical Education and Career Campus in Chubbuck $6.5 million to complete a regional CTE center that will serve students from surrounding communities who do not have access to programs. 

A major development was the Pocatello-Chubbuck school board’s decision last year to purchase the old 78,000 square foot Allstate building for around $12 million, using local plant facilities levy and federal money. But without the new grant, Naftz believes it would have taken another six to 10 years to complete the career center in stages.

“For 23 years we’ve been thinking, talking and trying to figure out how it is going to work. We got very serious about seven years ago. So we’ve been at this for a long time,” Naftz said. 

Surrounding school districts who could benefit from the regional CTE center are American Falls, Marsh Valley, Aberdeen, Rockland, Soda Springs, Grace and Malad. The center, expected to open in 2024, will serve between 1,000 to 1,400 students per day.

“We are opening that door for whichever students want to show up. When this building is finished, it’s not going to look like anything in the state. It’s going to be at a different level,” Naftz said. 

Are CTE teacher endorsements increasing?

The approval process for new CTE programs takes place during the spring with the approval cycle ending on Feb. 15.

“We anticipate to see a continued growth during the upcoming application window. (Our agency) has seen significant growth in CTE programs throughout the state over the past six years,” said Megan O’Rourke, director of communications for Career Technical Education.

There were 1,089 teachers teaching CTE courses in the 2022-23 school year. There are 1,083 teachers this school year in classrooms across the state, but the agency says that could increase.

The number of teachers “still has room to increase over the balance of this year,” the agency reports.

There were 338 secondary applications for CTE endorsements last year. So far this year, the number is 171 but “similar to the growth in programming, we anticipate continued growth in applications,” O’Rourke said. 

The following lists detail the $35.9 million approved by the ICRS council

Existing Programs

• Notus School District #135 – Welding Program $27,000
• Hansen School District #415 – Applied Accounting Program $25,530
• Murtaugh School District #418 – Ag Education Program $20,324
• Marsh Valley School District #21 – Automotive Service Technician and Mechanics $5,347
• COSSA #555 – Automotive-Diesel Program Equipment Upgrades $56,721
• Whitepine Joint School District #288 – Multi-Program Equipment Upgrades $47,871
• Mullan School District #392 – Mullan Welding Program Equipment Upgrades $61,248
• Oneida County School District #351 – CNC Plasma System $28,622
• Council School District #013 – Ag Facility Equipment Upgrades $23,000
• Wallace School District #393 – Welding & Wood Shop Equipment Upgrades $23,440
• Castleford School District #417 – Welding Program Upgrades $22,250
• Marsh Valley School District #21 – Welding Program Upgrades $32,617
• Bear Lake School District #033 – Automotive Technology Equipment Upgrades $17,195

New Programs

• Potlatch School District #285 – Forestry and Natural Resources Program $989,198
• Firth School District #59 – Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) Program $25,375
• Shelley School District #60 – Welding Program $55,457
• Orofino Joint School District #171 – Natural Resources & Forestry Pathway $528,100
• West Bonner School District #083 – CTE Natural Resources Pathway $725,240

Capital Projects

• Midvale School District #433 – Ag Education Facility Expansion $1,058,000
• Minidoka School District #331 – CTE Facility $4,900,000
• Pocatello-Chubbuck School District #25 – CTE Campus (PV-TEC) $6,500,000
• Kimberly School District #414 – Ag Education Facility Expansion $1,320,000
• Cassia County School District #151 – Diesel Program Facility $1,659,491
• Wilder School District #133 – Ag Education Facility Expansion $301,487
• Blackfoot School District #55 – CTE Center (BTEC) $3,898,071
• Sugar-Salem School District #322 – Multi-Program CTE Facility $2,700,000
• Soda Springs School District #150 – Multi-Program CTE Facility $370,960
• New Plymouth School District #372 – New Ag Education Building $2,272,799
• Cascade School District #422 – Ag Welding Shop HVAC/Electrical Upgrades $16,361
• Firth School District #59 – Ag Shop Upgrades $103,299
• Hansen School District #415 – Animal Science Pathway Facility $71,309
• Middleton School District #134 – Multi-Program CTE Facility $1,124,800
• Fremont County School District #215 – Greenhouse Facility $253,120
• Jefferson School District #251 – Multi-Program CTE Facility $5,300,000
• St. Maries Joint School District #041 – Multi-Program CTE Facility $1,280,934

Paraprofessionals provide support for students and teachers in areas like special education and student services. They can tutor students or assist the teacher with managing the classroom and organizing instructional materials, and provide individual support for students with special needs.

The PSC makes recommendations to the State Board of Education, which governs public educational institutions and school systems. The 18-member PSC voted unanimously Friday to recommend an assessment developed locally by the Boise School District, called the “Idaho Paraprofessional Testing Alternative” (IPTA).

There is “significant need” for an alternative test for rural schools, said Ryan Cantrell, chief deputy superintendent for the Idaho Department of Education and PSC member. Rural schools “can’t get people to the Praxis,” Cantrell said, referring to the Educational Testing Service’s (ETS) ParaPro Assessment, a reading, writing and math certification test for prospective paraprofessionals that is required in Idaho.

Many districts have potential hires drive to distant testing centers, one of four barriers contributing to the statewide shortage of paraprofessionals. Another factor is the $55 testing cost, which has to be paid each time a candidate takes or retakes the test. The other two are outdated equipment and an inordinately high passing score.

“Idaho needs every tool possible to help stem the tide of shortages,” a commission member said Friday morning.

School districts and charter schools have only one choice at the moment. Boise’s IPTA is an alternative method, so districts who prefer the current ETS test can continue using it. The IPTA is designed to meet both state and federal requirements. Idaho Code allows a state-approved assessment for endorsement.

The IPTA has a passing score of 75%. There are two exam options: a no-technology, paper-and-pencil version; and a Google Form version that is automatically graded and scores are saved. Individual school districts and charter schools can choose where to administer the test. The IPTA is free. 

Boise’s methodology utilized five measures: researching state and federal requirements; formatting the test to Idaho’s paraprofessional standards; developing consistency with the ETS test; employing a team of teachers to write content-specific test questions; beta-testing the assessment with teachers and paraprofessionals.

Jason Hutchinson, Boise’s director of human services, and his team presented the IPTA proposal to the PSC’s recommendation’s committee. He noted several issues about ETS’s testing procedures that are complicating the paraprofessional shortage.

One of those is maintaining technology capable of interfacing with ETS’ outdated systems — a major problem for Boise. The district administers the test in-house so it must maintain outdated systems in order to provide the test.

This year Boise administered 19 ETS exams. Two candidates did not pass. Last year, the district provided 56 tests and nine people failed. Those nine did not return to retake the test. At a price of $55, those 56 tests likely cost the district about $3,000.

In other business, the PSC voted unanimously to recommend that the State Board amend the ETS ParaPro Assessment qualifying score from 460 to 457.

The standards commission is an 18-member volunteer board made up of teachers, school administrators and higher education officials, who have the authority to approve, suspend and revoke teaching and administrative licenses in Idaho.

The commission revoked and suspended licenses for a range of violations, from rape to viewing pornography on a school computer.

Below are summaries of the complaints against the educators and the commission’s disciplinary decisions.

Wade Schvaneveldt — Soda Springs School District

Wade Schvaneveldt engaged in a sexual relationship with a teenager and he was sentenced in June to serve a prison term of 8-18 years. He held a career technical education certificate and a teaching certificate with economics and mathematics endorsements. He was convicted of two felonies related to the rape charge.

The PSC permanently revoked his teaching certifications.

Nancy H. Lucio — Heritage Academy

Nancy H. Lucio used her school district computer to forward confidential student and employee information to her personal email address. She held an interim administrative certificate with school principal endorsement and an interim teaching certificate with early childhood education and English as a second language endorsements.

The PSC issued a letter of reprimand for her personnel file and will require an ethics course be completed.

Mark Baer — Plummer-Worley School District

Mark Baer used his school district computer to view pornography. He holds a teaching certificate with English, social studies and history endorsements.

The PSC suspended his teaching certification for two years, with the condition he complete an ethics course and that a licensed counselor issue a letter demonstrating that he is fit to be in the classroom.

Christopher S. Perrigot — Minidoka County School District

Christopher S. Perrigot pleaded guilty to misdemeanor battery. He admitted to unlawfully touching the buttocks of a female student in 2021. He holds an alternative authorization content specialist license with all subjects endorsement and held a non-traditional CSI interim teaching certificate with all schools endorsement.

The PSC suspended his teaching certification for five years with possible conditional reinstatement: receiving the benefit of the withheld judgement or dismissal of the underlying conviction; no other criminal convictions; completion of two ethics courses on boundaries and classroom management.

Kelly Moysh — Blackfoot School District

Kelly Moysh provided diuretic Lasix pills to one or more students on the wrestling team. The pills are a banned substance and were obtained in Mexico. He drove a bus transporting the varsity wrestling team to Post Falls but did not have the proper certifications to drive the vehicle. He was both a teacher and wrestling coach. He holds a teaching certificate with visual arts endorsement.

The PSC did not take any action on his license. The PSC’s administrative complaint recommends suspending his teaching certification until he: completes an ethics, drug-free workplace and understanding academic dishonesty courses; and an honoring the game course from Positive Coaching Alliance.

Current administrative complaints

EdNews obtained four additional administrative complaints through a record’s request. The PSC has not made a final decision against the teacher, staff or administrator being investigated for violating Idaho Code. The state provides an opportunity to contest the allegations contained in the complaint during its administrative proceeding, if requested by the person accused of wrongdoing. One or more of the cases could be placed on the PSC’s next scheduled meeting for disciplinary decisions.

Cory Gaylor — Kuna School District

Cory Gaylor pleaded guilty to lewd conduct with a child under the age of 16 and “children-enticing” over the Internet. He was convicted in 2023. He holds a teaching certificate with world language and Spanish endorsements. The PSC recommends permanent revocation of his certifications, according to the administrative complaint.

Eric M. McDermott — Boise School District

Eric M. McDermott was convicted of  sexual battery of a minor child between the ages of 16-17. He was convicted this year. He holds a teaching certificate with English, social studies and history endorsements. He was employed by the Boise school district during the 2022-23 school year. The PSC recommends permanent revocation of his certifications, according to the administrative complaint.

Ronald Stone — Coeur d’Alene School District

Ronald Stone was convicted in 2022 of two counts of lewd conduct with a minor under the age of 16. He is serving life in prison. He held a teaching certificate with all subjects endorsement and a pupil service certificate with a school counselor endorsement. The PSC recommends permanent revocation of his certifications, according to the administrative complaint.

Donald B. Young — COSSA Schools

Donald B. Young made inappropriate comments to colleagues and students, such as a desire to have sex with colleagues and commenting on female students’ bodies. He holds an occupational specialist teaching certificate with auto maintenance and light repair endorsements. He was employed by COSSA Schools — Parma, Notus, Wilder and Marsing schools districts – during the 2022-23 school year. The PSC recommends suspending his certifications until he completes ethics, boundaries and classroom management courses. Evidence of completion must be provided to the commission prior to consideration for reinstatement, according to the administrative complaint.

Executive committee recommendations

The PSC’s executive committee went into a short executive session to review three cases. In open session, they did not use names but case file numbers. They declined a counteroffer in case 22317 (Kelly Moysh), recommended to permanently revoke the teacher’s certificate in case 22327 and revoke the teacher’s certificate in case 22314. EdNews requested more information on cases 22327 and 22314 but was informed that these documents are not currently a public record. These cases could come before the PSC at a future meeting.

The PSC staff reported that two complaints had been reviewed and returned without an administrative complaint issued; there are three new cases for the executive committee to review at its next meeting and eight new cases recently opened that could come before the PSC for review.

That news came as no surprise to Decoding Dyslexia Idaho and education advocate Ashley Brittain, an attorney with The Brittain Group, who filed the federal complaint, after years of repeated attempts to convince the Sherri Ybarra administration that Idaho was out of compliance. Ybarra served eight years as Idaho’s Superintendent of Public Instruction.

“It’s unfortunate that Debbie Critchfield inherited this because we started this fight in 2018 under the previous superintendent,” said Robin Sikmund, founder of Decoding Dyslexia Idaho. 

Idaho’s criteria for providing students with specific learning disability (SLD) services represent “a higher bar” than what is allowed by federal law, according to a letter from the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP).

“Idaho has been incorrectly identifying” thousands of children under the category of SLD, according to an email from The Brittain Group to state officials.

Sikmund said students with learning disabilities — like dyslexia or dysgraphia – were repeatedly denied services for years. As an advocate for parents, she attended countless Individualized Education Program eligibility meetings across the state in several school districts. IEPs outline special education instruction and services.

If parents and their advocates “pushed back” hard after being denied SLD services, Sikmund said, a district would place the student in the other health impairment (OHI) category, which does not guarantee the same services. Dyslexia falls under the SLD category.

“Even our qualifying category numbers alone should have been a red flag to most. Idaho’s largest qualifying category is OHI.  Whereas in most states, SLD is the most common qualifying category.  This makes sense, considering dyslexia affects one-in-five children,” she said.

The Department of Education will begin work on revising the state’s Special Education Manual following the OSEP’s inquiry, a press release states.

In an Oct. 20 letter, OSEP directed the state to examine portions of the manual that address what is required for students to receive special education services for SLD. 

The OSEP outlined five required steps to be completed in 90 days. Among OSEP’s requirements is “review and revise” eligibility criteria for identifying a child with an SLD under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. A notification of policy revisions must be issued to all public agencies, local education agencies, parent advocacy groups, the state advisory panel and other interested parties advising them of the state’s revised eligibility criteria.

Sikmund said, “It’s a game changer. These kids are going to finally have a chance at getting effective small group instruction that they need. Without them qualifying, those students fall through the cracks, further and further behind.”

When the manual is eventually revised, “massive” training is needed statewide, Sikmund said. “All of the special education supervisors, and therefore their schools, have been trained to follow criteria that is not in compliance with federal law. They have to be re-trained.”

The Department of Education will convene a working group that will meet Dec. 19 at 8 a.m. at the Department of Education’s Barbara Morgan Conference Room. Those interested in providing input for the group can submit comments to SpEdPublicInput@sde.idaho.gov. 

“It’s unfortunate for the thousands of kids that attempted to seek support and services … that were turned away,” Brittain said in the email.

The finalists are Monica Church, Michelle Dunstan and Jacob Smith. The commission would not share their professional backgrounds. 

As the state’s largest charter school authorizer, the charter commission director leads a team monitoring academic and financial outcomes for 66 schools across the state. The director’s position has been unstable since March — two director resignations and a current interim director. 

When the commission declined to release finalists’ names following an executive session, Idaho Education News submitted a public record’s request for their names and professional experience contained in their resumes. 

The commission’s interim director Alex Adams, the state’s budget director, has shared EdNews’ request for their professional experience with the deputy attorney general and will respond Thursday, he told EdNews in an email. Adams believes Idaho Code 74-106(1) protects their resumes from public disclosure.

“As I do not currently have written consent from the applicants, I am unable to fulfill at this time,” Adams told EdNews. 

The director is a state employee compensated with taxpayer dollars. The position pays $108,000 to $118,500 annually, according to the job listing.

The charter commission scheduled a special meeting next Thursday at 1 p.m. to interview the candidates. EdNews was told that those interviews will likely take place in executive session.

The three candidates

EdNews was able to find basic background information using social media posts and agency websites but was unable to verify the information from the commission or the candidates.

Church is the executive director of the Frank Church Institute at Boise State University. She is a strong advocate for “youth voices, democratic values and the environment.” A longtime educator and public servant, she holds degrees in philosophy, history, secondary social studies education, and a master’s in education leadership and administration.

Dunstan is a former education director at Anser Charter School in Boise. She’s also served as a community based curriculum director and elementary teacher. She holds a master’s in education leadership and administration and a bachelor’s in elementary education from Boise State University, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Smith is the charter commission’s finance program manager. Prior to joining the commission staff in 2022, he spent over 13 years as the director of operations for Idaho Digital Learning Alliance. During his tenure as director, he provided support and oversight of the school’s finances, budgets, facilities, policies and human resources. He has degrees in business administration and in accounting from Boise State University.

Monday’s executive session

During a 30-minute, closed-door executive session Monday, the commissioners said they made a decision to narrow their search for a new director to three candidates, from a pool of 16. 

After the board returned to an open session, a motion was made to select “their top three candidates” to interview next week. The motion did not include their names and it passed unanimously. 

Commission chairman Alan Reed told EdNews that deputy attorney general Tim Davis said to “use a number” when referring to the applicants, because that is a “personnel matter.”

When asked for the names after the meeting, Davis told EdNews that their resumes could not be released but their names are public record. 

Those names were not released to EdNews until late Wednesday evening by Adams and he declined to include their professional background history. He said in an email that EdNews would have to take the commission to Ada County District Court to compel the agency to release the information. EdNews asked Adams to reconsider his position and he said he’d take EdNews’ argument back to the attorney general’s office. EdNews will continue to pursue the information because Idaho law indicates that professional background — such as work history, education and place of employment — is public record. 

Idaho Code 74-106 reads in part that all personnel records of a current or former public official are not considered public record, “other than the public official’s public service or employment history, classification, pay grade and step, longevity, gross salary and salary history … status, workplace and employing agency.”

The requested background from their resumes are not part of the exempt portion. The Public Records Law Manual buttresses Idaho Code 74-196 and includes an admission that “the Legislature acknowledges that there is some loss of privacy when one accepts a position supported by public money.” 

Adams stepped in as interim director following the resignation of two directors in the span of five months. Nichole Hall resigned in August after less than two months on the job to accept another position. She had replaced Jenn Thompson, who resigned in March alongside former commissioner Brian Scigliano in protest of board decisions they deemed irresponsible.

EdNews Data Analyst Randy Schrader contributed to this report. 

GARDEN VALLEY — The Garden Valley School District has repeatedly violated a federal law that requires children with disabilities to receive a free and appropriate public education, according to two reports from the State Department of Education. 

Two families with children with special needs who are enrolled in the district filed separate, formal complaints in September, alleging multiple district violations of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). 

The State Department investigated and found that all of the allegations — 11 combined — were founded and the district was out of compliance, according to reports provided to the parents. EdNews obtained the reports from the families.  

The state investigation calls out the district for a number of inappropriate practices, including: 

• Frequently secluding a student in a padded room that was formerly a utility closet
• Failing to adequately train staff
• Keeping a student out of school for 10 days or more without following the appropriate procedures and protocols
• Inappropriately relying on a school resource officer to manage special education student behavior
• Stifling parent participation in creating a learning plan for their student
• Providing little to no direct instruction for a student, and instead relying on an online program
• Failing to adopt the state’s special education manual or a restraint and seclusion policy

In both cases, the state investigator, Courtney Wucetich, established a plan that the district must adhere to to remedy its failures, which includes:

• Properly training staff, then implementing the training
• Adopting the state’s special education manual and restraint and seclusion policy
• Holding special education meetings, and developing and creating needed special education plans
• Developing a plan to provide compensatory services for the students (such as therapy, counseling, etc.)
• Paying for an impartial school psychologist assigned by the State Department

For the families involved, both of whom asked to remain anonymous out of fears of retaliation, the reports came as no surprise. 

“It just confirmed what we already knew,” said the parent of a 15-year-old student with special needs, who will be referred to as Student A. “It’s just one more step in the process of cleaning up the district.”

 The second report was filed by the parents of a nine-year-old with autism, who will be referred to as Student B. One of Student B’s parents said he was disheartened by the report. 

 “It breaks my heart because now I understand why (my student is) so traumatized about school,” he said. “(My student is) truly scared of going to school and that’s not something any kid should fear, for any reason whatsoever.” 

Both families have also filed formal complaints with the Office of Civil Rights. One is being actively investigated, and the other is being reviewed for possible investigation. 

Patrick Goff, the Garden Valley superintendent, said he had no comment. 

The investigations, which came to light in part via social media posts shared by Student B’s family, have riled the Garden Valley community. Some said they have similar concerns about the district’s treatment of their special education students. Others defended and praised the district.

Both families are hoping the investigations will lead to improved and fair education opportunities for their children, and for special education students to come. 

“At the end of the day, what I want from all this is simple: for this to be exposed so that no more kids get hurt,” one of Student B’s parents said. 

Locked alone in a padded room: Student B’s education was repeatedly mishandled, investigation concludes

Demystifying Jargon: Individualized Education Plan
-An IEP identifies a student’s needs and includes specific, measurable goals to “enable the student to make adequate progress in the general education curriculum.” The plan must include “a variety of assessment tools and strategies, including information provided by the parent, to identify the functional, developmental, and academic needs of the student.”

-A team (which could include general education teachers, special education teachers, counselors, administrators, a school psychologist, parents, and the student) meets periodically to develop, review, and revise the plan. 

The district’s failures to educate and provide services to Student B were wide-ranging, according to the report, and included:

Not having a current Individualized Education Plan (IEP) for a student with special needs 

• • • The district also failed to properly review and revise the plan as needed. Progress reports were also not included in the plan. 
    • “The District failed to develop an appropriate IEP with measurable goals and failed to identify needed related services,” according to the report. 

Substantial deviations from the IEP that was in place

• • • • For example, the plan called for the student to be in a general education classroom 100% of the school day. Instead, the student was in the extended resource room or a padded isolation room for most of the day. 

Using restraint and seclusion to manage student behavior, instead of positive interventions and supports, and without the IEP team determining that such placement was the best for the student. Further, the district continued the practice even when the student and parents told the district about its negative impacts. 

• • • This involved the student being placed alone in a padded room “for undocumented periods of time, and for unknown frequency,” with “very little interaction with peers”.
    • “Although emails from the parents reflected that the Student was terrified of school, terrified of the self-contained classroom, and that the use of the self-contained room caused harm to the Student, this information was not considered by the District.”
    • Staff members would “carry” the student to the padded room, a form of restraint. 
    • The district also lacked a policy on restraint and seclusion. 
    • The district used restraint and seclusion “as a punitive measure, or out of convenience” rather than as a last resort. 

Inappropriate use of the School Resource Officer (SRO)

• • Federal law does not prohibit a district “from referring a student to law enforcement for alleged criminal behavior,” according to the report. However, a district should not refer students to the SRO in order to “circumvent its obligation to consider the use of positive behavioral interventions and supports and other strategies to address a student’s behavior that impedes the student’s learning, or the learning of others.”

Paraprofessionals were not adequately trained and supervised

• • The paraprofessionals “engaged in power struggles with the Student,” according to the report. 
  • There was no record that these staff members received training on how to use positive behavioral interventions and strategies.
  • Staff members did not use de-escalation strategies, teach coping skills, or redirect misbehavior. 
  • The paraprofessional was also not trained to objectively collect data, and instead judged the student’s behavior. 

Staff regularly used inappropriate techniques to manage student behavior

• • These included restraint and seclusion and the use of the SRO “which are not appropriate,” the report found.
  • “A staff member who restrained and secluded the Student on multiple occasions did not participate in the District’s in-service training, as evidenced by a lack of a training certificate in the file.”
  • “The means by which the paraprofessional staff restrained and secluded the Student, by carrying them and locking them in the self-contained classroom with unknown frequency and duration, is not consistent with an appropriate use of PBIS.”

Removing the student from school for more than 10 school days, without the appropriate protocol being followed

• • The student was frequently removed from school, either formally via suspensions or informally by school staff asking parents to pick up their student. 
  • When students are removed from school for more than 10 days, the district must follow a set of procedures and protocol called a Manifest Determination. The district did not do so. 
  • “Hundreds of pages of email exchanges provided by both the parents and the District reflect that the frequency of informal removals, coupled with formal suspensions, exceeded a cumulative ten school days,” according to the report.

“The lack of resources is not a defense”: How the district failed Student A

According to Student A’s report, four allegations put forward by the family were founded. They included violations such as:

Inadequate IEPs

• • The plans designed for the student were inadequate and did not meet the student’s needs. This includes a failure to provide the student with “specially designed instruction,” discuss or offer related services, and limited involvement/input from the school psychologist. 
  • The district “did not use a variety of assessment tools and strategies, including information provided by the parent, to identify the functional, developmental, and academic needs of the student in the development, review, and revision of the IEP.”

The district primarily relied on an online program for the student’s instruction in the 22-23 school year

• • Last school year, “there was little to no direct instruction provided to the Student. Instead the District relied almost exclusively on MobyMax for the majority” of the year. 
  • Student A’s parents confirmed this with EdNews, and said their student had been learning primarily from home since August 2022. Their student was originally learning from an online program, and is now using paper packets and meets with a teacher two hours a day at the local library. 

Failures are partly due to lack of resources — but that’s not an excuse

• • The failure to provide services is partly due to a lack of resources, the investigator found. “However, the lack of resources is not a defense to the District’s failure.” 

Student A’s progress reports were lacking

• • • Progress reports did not indicate how Student A was progressing toward annual IEP goals. 

Parental participation was stifled

• • • Federal law mandates that parents have a central role in developing IEPs. However, the state investigator found that “parental participation was stifled in all decisions related to the Student’s IEP development, including placement.” The district essentially determined the plan before consulting parents. 

Moving forward: Next steps for the families

Both families see the corrective action plan outlined in the investigation as a step forward. But both hope the complaints to the Office of Civil Rights (one of which is being reviewed for possible investigation; the other is being actively investigated) will result in more stringent outcomes for the district officials involved. 

One of Student B’s parents said he felt compelled to file the complaints to fight for his child, and to hold staff members accountable for what they’d done. 

“Sometimes someone has to take a stand and say when something’s not right,” one of Student B’s parents said.

But even with the corrective action plan in place, Student B’s family hopes to move out of state, to a place with more resources for their child. The family moved to Garden Valley a few years ago from the Boise area. 

But Student A’s family has long lived in Garden Valley and intends to stay there. 

“I grew up in the area and so I’m not going to let the good old boys’ club push me out,” one of Student A’s parents said. 

Ultimately he hopes the investigation will result in his student being able to return to school, where the student can interact with peers again. 

“We have been pushing from day one to get him back into school.”

Petra Kennedy, a Moscow High School senior who’s among Idaho’s semifinalists, said, “My drive for excellence comes from my family. I’m interested in academics because my mom and dad instilled a sense of curiosity and determination in me early on … but past that, I’ve had some very inspirational teachers.”

Her classmate, Max Pieper, 17, is motivated to succeed because he truly enjoys learning about different topics and “making connections between them.” With plans to attend the Naval Academy, Pieper has a keen interest in foreign relations, like the tension between Taiwan and China. 

“I’ve always been interested in … how different factors can influence countries’ actions. Seeing the political maneuvering and how the economics of Taiwan’s semiconductor industry ties into it is really fascinating to me,” Pieper said.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists represents less than one percent of all U.S. high school seniors. The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors. The program selected 100 Idaho students.

Thirty-four percent of the state’s total number of semifinalists are from the Boise School District. “Congratulations to the students who have earned recognition as a national semifinalist and honored for their academic ability,” said Coby Dennis, Boise School District superintendent.

The following six high schools boasted the highest number of semifinalists: Boise High School, 16; Timberline High School, 15; Renaissance High School, 8; Moscow High School, 5; Cole Valley Christian High School, 4; Idaho Falls High School, 4; Bishop Kelly High School, 4.

Seventeen-year-old Kieran Long said, “I don’t really know where my ‘drive for excellence’ comes from. My parents encouraged me to do well in school, but that doesn’t cover everything. I try to do well in school simply because I know I can, and it feels disappointing to not do as well as I know I can.”

The scholarship program is an annual academic competition among high school students for recognition and college scholarships. Millions of students vie for admission to the program and scholarships worth nearly $28 million. As they traverse the program, students are awarded status levels: commended, semifinalist, finalist and finally merit scholars. Scholarship winners are announced in the spring.

To become a finalist, semifinalists must submit a detailed scholarship application that includes an academic record, participation in school and community activities, demonstrated leadership abilities, employment, and honors and awards received. 

Long hasn’t selected a specific academic path because he enjoys every subject. “I want to use college to figure out what I am truly interested in and what I want to do for the rest of my life,” he said.

Mason Bledsoe plans to study aerospace engineering with a focus on propulsion technology. “My drive for excellence mostly comes from my interests. I just happen to be really fascinated by topics that are covered in school.”

2024 Idaho National Merit Scholarship Program Semifinalists 

BOISE HIGH SCHOOL

Taelyn J. Baiza

Sophia Y. Chen

Adriana M. Curtis 

Reece J. Deidrick

Fiona A. Fleisher 

Lauren E. Gee

Noe H. Kemper

Avery Lott

Lauren E. Olsen

Tyson E. Russell

Keyton S. Smith

Nicholas Thomas

Cory Thomas-Liddle

James Welcker 

Megan Wolin

Oliver T. Wroten

CAPITAL HIGH SCHOOL

Sophia Bourgeau

Anthony Donegan

Luke O. McKinney

CENTENNIAL HIGH SCHOOL

Christopher Dunkley

HOMESCHOOL

Zelia M. Vidales

Ellyn L. Tran 

BISHOP KELLY HIGH SCHOOL

Wesley B. Barton

Ryan A. Buckner

Isaac V. Pettyjohn

Hoyoon Song

RIVERSTONE INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL

Fiona Van De Graaff

TIMBERLINE HIGH SCHOOL

Ibrahim Ahmad

Garrett T. Eppich

Isaac Estrada

Austin J. Giffen

Jaya Kasthuri

Bhavya Kistupati

Hayoon Lee

Elena Li

Nathan X. Li

Stephanie Liu

Margaret McCormick

Kahlil Monje

Alessandra Truax

Forrest Zeng

Kevin Zhu

COEUR D’ALENE CHARTER ACADEMY

Henry DePew

Abigail Moehring

COEUR D’ALENE HIGH SCHOOL

Jameson J. Dale

Andrew C. Hubbard

Isabella O. Le

EAGLE HIGH SCHOOL

Annalise DeMange

Nikita Didenko

Tristan Walker

WOOD RIVER HIGH SCHOOL

Lucas A. Smith

IDAHO FALLS HIGH SCHOOL

Victor S. Huang 

Alexander B. Kingma

Grace E. Madsen

Katelyn G. Traynor

THUNDER RIDGE HIGH SCHOOL

Samuel C. Spencer

KIMBERLY HIGH SCHOOL

Mallory Otto

KUNA HIGH SCHOOL

James M. Leckie 

MCCALL-DONNELLY HIGH SCHOOL

George Speirs

AMBROSE SCHOOL

Krystin A. Collingwood

COLE VALLEY CHRISTIAN HIGH SCHOOL

Micah P. Hatfield

Rinoa J. Oliver

Jacob Parnell

Brandon M. Vander Stelt

MERIDIAN MEDICAL ARTS CHARTER

Bekir Swidan

MERIDIAN TECHNICAL CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL

Joshua Richmond

MOUNTAIN VIEW HIGH SCHOOL

Gavin S. Keller

OWYHEE HIGH SCHOOL

Micah Palin

RENAISSANCE HIGH SCHOOL

Cameron Z. Beaver

Hannah Beaver

Colman Lee

Brooklyn D. Lewis

Lucy Porter

Logan S. Ray

Hannah Scoville

Johnathan Van Vliet

ROCKY MOUNTAIN HIGH SCHOOL

Rachel Roberts

MOSCOW HIGH SCHOOL

Mason Bledsoe

Petra Kennedy

Kieran Long

Max Pieper

Dylan Taylor

MOUNTAIN HOME HIGH SCHOOL

Gareth P. Brantley

SKYVIEW HIGH SCHOOL

Melissa Eyer

CENTURY HIGH SCHOOL

Josh T. Agres

Evelyn R. Brittin

HIGHLAND HIGH SCHOOL

Ellie G. Burnside

Elise L. Wood

POCATELLO HIGH SCHOOL

Elijah C. Buchanan

Clare M. Earnest

Caleb A. Jensen

CLASSICAL CHRISTIAN ACADEMY

Michael P. Bell

MADISON HIGH SCHOOL

Camilla J. Cullimore

Casey Donahoo

Elena M. Pack

SANDPOINT HIGH SCHOOL

Keane J. Haesle

TWIN FALLS HIGH SCHOOL

Benjamin T. Rands

Zachariah L. Swensen

Mason B. Ward

XAVIER CHARTER SCHOOL

Anna Aiello

Idaho Education News has made a formal request for the candidates’ names and their professional and educational backgrounds. 

Commissioners evaluated 16 candidates during a 30-minute, closed-door executive session on Monday afternoon. After the board reconvened in open session, a motion was made to select “their top three candidates” to interview for the executive director’s position, which has been vacant since August. The motion did not include their names. The motion passed unanimously.  

A hiring decision is expected by the end of December, said Alex Adams, the state’s budget director, who has served as the commission’s interim director since August.

Commissioners previously decided that a closed meeting is necessary to promote frank conversations about the candidates. Idaho law allows public boards to meet privately when discussing hiring. But the law also says that decisions are not to be made in closed meetings.

Because the board chose not to use any candidate names during an open meeting on Monday, EdNews requested the names of every candidate and their resumes. A deputy attorney general in attendance Monday said, “Under the public records act, the applicants’ resumes at this point are exempt. The names of those applicants are considered public record but only the top five.”

A public records request was submitted after the meeting, requesting the names and professional background for their top-three applicants. At the time of publication, Adams had not yet responded.

Adams said the plan is to conduct interviews on Dec. 7 during an executive session; and a decision could come as early as Dec. 7 or at the board’s regular meeting on Dec. 14, which will take place in the Senate Education Committee room in the Capitol building.

Adams stepped in as interim director following the resignation of two directors in the span of five months. Nichole Hall resigned in August after less than two months on the job to accept another position. She had replaced Jenn Thompson, who resigned in March alongside former commissioner Brian Scigliano. The pair accused the board of acting irresponsibly.

The charter commission is Idaho’s largest charter school authorizer. Authorizers evaluate new charter school petitions and oversee the financial, academic and operational effectiveness of schools it approved. They protect the interest of students and taxpayers by holding schools accountable to performance outcomes. The charter commission authorizes 63 out of Idaho’s 77 schools. School districts and universities can also serve as authorizers.

Idaho school trustees wrapped up their business in Boise on Friday by approving seven proposed policy positions for lawmakers to consider in the 2024 legislative session. 

Friday morning’s session marked the final day of the Idaho School Boards Association’s (ISBA) annual convention that draws more than 500 statewide school leaders. There were seven resolutions on the docket, all of which carried “do-pass” recommendations from the ISBA’s executive board. Here are the summaries of those resolutions and the margins of victory. 

Aligning Idaho’s school age and public school accountability requirements

The resolution is sponsored by the Caldwell School District. It requests a change to the “required school age” in Idaho code from 16 to 18, unless the student has graduated early or has received a GED. Districts cannot ensure that students who drop out at age 16 meet necessary education requirements. There was no debate.

Yes: 6,045      No: 1,500

K-12 funding formula principles

The resolution is sponsored by the Boise School District. It requests the ISBA to work with the Legislature to adopt a funding formula that considers nine principles. These guiding principles represent a philosophical direction for funding public schools: budget predictability; adequately provide sufficient funding; fiscal transparency; annual budget stability; uniform and thorough support; funds quality staffing; ensure that no district loses funding; maintain enrollment-based funding; accountability that’s tied to each district’s goals. 

Yes: 7,401     No: 171

Open enrollment program and building capacity limits

The resolution is sponsored by the Boise School District. This resolution seeks to manage the open enrollment process enacted this year because it needs more clarity. Idaho students can attend any school in the state, regardless of their address. There was some debate about how this will affect special needs programs. The resolution opposes a capacity exception tied only to grade-level enrollment. It requests modifying code to allow districts to make open enrollment decisions based on current allowed enrollment exceptions, and include both building capacity and special education capacity in those exceptions.

Yes: 6,191      No: 944

Requirements for paraprofessional employment in Idaho

This resolution seeks to reduce barriers for the recruitment of paraprofessionals. The current PRAXIS requirement is one of the main barriers. Local districts are no longer able to administer the test. The resolution asks that districts and charters be allowed to use a Board of Education approved local assessment or use an existing Board of Education approved subject matter competency test. 

Yes: 7,618      No: 0

Career ladder placement for school nurse and speech/language personnel

The intent of the resolution is to develop a system for paying school nurse and speech/language personnel a salary that is commensurate with their professional and/or in-school experiences and to assist school districts in the recruitment and retention of such professional staff. There was no debate.

Yes: 7,479      No: 109

Streamlining consistent ISBA legislative priorities

ISBA members have priorities that may never be fully accomplished and others may take more time to accomplish. Instead of asking each resolution to be renewed, this streamlines the process and provides an avenue for other consistent priorities to be included in one resolution. Those priorities include: school boards retain strong governance and decision-making authority; consider more accurate, adequate, efficient and reliable options for funding school facilities; oppose tax dollars being allocated to private or parochial schools; oppose legislation that creates more undue burden on public schools. There was no debate.

Yes: 6,833      No: 744

Bond and levy election communications

The resolution’s sponsor is Bonneville Joint School District. It directs the ISBA to work with the Legislature to amend existing statute to allow school districts and other taxing districts more flexibility in communicating brief messages and reminders about public elections. The current statute makes it difficult to pass bond levies because a simple text to parents like “remember to vote” could invalidate an entire election. Communication to 20 or more patrons must include the same language contained on the election ballot, which adds anywhere from 50 to 200 words. The resolution seeks to clarify the law so it correctly reflects the intent of the Legislature. There was limited debate and it was all supportive of the measure.

Yes: 7,493      No: 99

The ISBA membership voted to elect two new executive committee members. The new president-elect is Brian Pyper of Madison School District. Pyper is a professor of physics with BYU-Idaho in Rexburg and a father of four. The outgoing president-elect is Starr Olsen. The new vice president is Jason Sevy, a dairy quality specialist, who serves on the Marsing School District board. The outgoing vice president is Brian Pyper.

Trustees from across the state meet each year for training, expert presentations and to vote on a legislative platform driven by proposals from local leaders. 

Applications for the Idaho Career Ready Students (ICRS) grant program opened four months ago and state leaders have awarded a total of approximately $35 million. The grant money targets new or expanding career technical programs focused on in-demand careers.

On Monday, the ICRS council announced its newest round of recipients: 22 plans and programs were awarded $19 million. In total, 108 applications were received in the past four months, with requests surpassing availability by $66 million.

“When we see $111 million in requests from our districts and charters, it definitely underscores the demand for CTE and the difference that this program can make for communities across Idaho. As these programs grow and mature, they will support students’ career prospects while also addressing the state’s workforce needs,” said Superintendent Debbie Critchfield. 

The idea is to allocate a portion of the grant money to build up programs that will train graduates to meet the needs of local industries. In the Panhandle, that means timber products. Approximately $2.4 million of the latest grant money awarded this week is aimed at that target. 

The following grants were awarded to fund new forestry and natural resources programs:

• Orofino Joint School District was awarded up to $528,100 to fund the natural resources and forestry pathway at Orofino Jr./Sr. High School and Timberline Schools.
• West Bonner County School District was awarded up to $725,240 to fund the CTE natural resources pathway at Priest River Lamanna High School.
• St. Marie’s Joint School District was awarded up to $1.2 million to fund a forestry and auto mechanic program at St. Marie’s High School.

Priest River students interested in a forestry career will soon have an opportunity to pursue their career passion. The school’s $725,240 grant includes approximately $208,000 for equipment and $516,000 for a new 4,000 square foot facility.

With the money, Jared Hughes, a Priest River natural resources and forestry teacher, plans to develop a new CTE pathway for grades 7-12: forestry science and management; forest products operations and production; wildlife ecology and management; geographic information system, global positioning system, drones and mapping. 

According to Hughes, the school will also be working with industry partners to:

• Provide learning and internship opportunities not currently available to students.
• Develop skills and certifications in conjunction with the industry partners to speed up the development of work-ready students.
• Increase average daily attendance by providing more hands-on, kinesthetic learning opportunities that appeal to non-traditional students.
• Increase the graduation rate. Having more opportunities in multiple CTE pathways will hopefully motivate more students to stay in school. 

“West Bonner is immensely grateful to the ICRS council for its approval of our proposal,” Hughes said in a press release. 

Approximately $17.4 million was awarded for capital projects in the following districts:

• Blackfoot School District was awarded up to $3,898,071 to fund the Blackfoot Technical Education Center.
• Sugar Salem School District was awarded up to $2,700,000 to support the Sugar-Salem Regional CTE Facility.
• Soda Springs Joint School was awarded up to $370,960 to fund a multi-program CTE facility at Soda Springs High School.
• New Plymouth School District was awarded up to $2,272,799 to fund a new agricultural education building at New Plymouth High School.
• Cascade School District was awarded up to $16,361 to fund HVAC and electrical upgrades to the agricultural welding shop at Cascade High School.
• Firth School District was awarded up to $103,299 to fund agricultural shop upgrades at Firth High School,
• Hansen Middle School District was awarded up to $71,309 to fund an animal science pathway Facility at Hansen Jr./Sr. High School.
• Middleton School District was awarded up to $1,124,800 to fund a construction and auto technician program at Middleton Academy.
• Fremont County Joint School District was awarded up to $253,120 to fund a greenhouse initiative at South Fremont High School.
• Jefferson School District was awarded up to $5,800,000 to fund a CTE expansion at Rigby High School.

The following grants were awarded to support existing programs:

• Canyon Owyhee School Service Agency (COSSA) was awarded up to $56,721 to fund automotive and diesel program equipment upgrades at the COSSA Regional Technology and Education Center.
• Whitepine Joint School District was awarded up to $47,871 to fund multi-program equipment upgrades at Deary School.
• Mullen School District was awarded up to $61,248 to fund welding program upgrades at Mullen High School.
• Oneida Joint School District was awarded up to $28,622 to fund its CNC plasma system at Malad High School.
• Council School District was awarded up to $23,000 to fund a request for agricultural facility equipment upgrades at Council High School.
• Wallace School District was awarded up to $23,440 to fund welding and wood shop equipment upgrades at Wallace Jr./Sr. High School.
• Castleford School District was awarded up to $22,250 to fund welding program upgrades at Castleford Schools.
• Marsh Valley School District was awarded up to $32,617 to fund welding program upgrades at Marsh Valley High School.
• Bear Lake School District was awarded up to $17,195 to fund automotive technology equipment upgrades at Bear Lake High School.

School districts and charters can apply for the funds here. The ICRS program was approved by the Legislature earlier this year and signed into law by Gov. Brad Little on March 31. Questions can be directed to program coordinator Allison Duman at aduman@sde.idaho.gov.

The money can be used to purchase new equipment and programs or hire experts to help strengthen an authorizer’s operations.

A decision about collaborating with Bluum likely won’t happen until a new director is hired, which is expected before the end of the year, based on comments at a meeting this month. Two more special meetings are scheduled, one this month and one in December. The seven-person board also has three new members whose appointments are pending Senate confirmation in the upcoming legislative session.

Since August, Alex Adams, the state’s budget director, has served as commission’s interim director, following the departure of two directors in the span of five months. The commission reported that the search for a new director is narrowing. Ten candidates applied.

Regarding the collaboration, “that would have to be a decision that was made by the commission staff and the board. We’re not going to tell them what to do,” said Terry Ryan, Bluum CEO.

Adams said the commission is excited that Bluum secured the grant funds. “Bluum has been a tremendous resource to me and I have full faith the commission could benefit from the substantial grant fund assistance but the details are best left to the next director.”

Adams said the decision about “how to best leverage those funds” is a decision for the next permanent director.

Bluum, a nonprofit charter support organization, was awarded a new $24.8 million federal grant this year to grow and strengthen Idaho’s charter school network. That grant allows up to 3% of the money — or $750,000 — to help improve quality authorizing.

Charter authorizers evaluate new charter school petitions and oversee the financial, academic and operational effectiveness of schools it approved. Authorizers protect the interest of students and taxpayers by holding schools accountable to performance outcomes. The public charter commission authorizes 63 out of Idaho’s 77 schools. School districts and universities can also be authorizers.

According to recent research titled “The Nation’s Charter Report Card,” students whose charter schools are authorized by a state education agency earn higher scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) than students whose schools were authorized by school districts and comparable local agencies. Overall, the top-performing states are Alaska, Colorado, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Oklahoma and New Jersey; Idaho finished near the middle of the pack and is underperforming nationally, according to the report.

The report pointed out that agencies affiliated with state departments of education — like the charter commission — have an advantage, because they are able to utilize efficiencies, decades of experience and institutional knowledge. 

Ryan said Congress authorized and encouraged the use of these grant funds to strengthen authorizers. “We would love to partner with the commission in utilizing the funds to improve their capacities and their efforts. It’s part of the promise we made for this grant,” he said.

That help could come in the form of contracting with experts; purchasing a web-based organization management system like Epicenter; staffing up for an extra year or two to help with backlogs; supporting the staff with resources and training; or updating their data acquisition and reporting processes.

“We wouldn’t do the work. We would bring in the resources. If the commission really wants this help, they’re really good groups across the country that help authorizers,”  Ryan said.  “But this is really a question for them — they know better what they need than I do.”

Based on his research into federal law, Ryan is confident that there is not a conflict of interest, if an organization like Bluum works with an organization like Idaho’s charter commission.

Disclosure: Idaho Education News and Bluum are funded by grants from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation. 

On top-ten lists from the state’s most prominent academic achievement measures, the school district was everywhere. 

Its schools repeatedly outshone their peers on the Idaho Standards Achievement Test and the Idaho Reading Indicator. And the district far outpaced other large districts when it came to scores on both exams. 

So what sets the district apart?

West Ada leaders will tell you the difference is mindset: Teachers and leaders who believe they have more to learn. From top to bottom, staff members keep asking: How can we do better?

To find the answers, they’re sitting in on classes, personalizing and perfecting professional development, crunching student achievement numbers, and defining what it means to be a great teacher — in their own terms.

“It takes everybody at every level being willing to be open minded and willing to learn and improve their craft. Because if we’re growing as adults then the students will grow too.”  — Shana Hawkins, West Ada’s director of accountability and success

As Shana Hawkins, the district’s director of accountability and success, said: “It takes everybody at every level being willing to be open minded and willing to learn and improve their craft. Because if we’re growing as adults then the students will grow, too.”

In a district where student success makes headlines, here’s what leaders are doing differently. 

Facts and figures: A portrait of West Ada by the numbers

First, it’s helpful to have some context about West Ada — what it is and isn’t, according to the data.

West Ada is:

• The state’s largest district by far, with about 38,000 students and 58 schools. (The runner-up is Boise with about 22,000 students)
  • Because of that is has more resources — more state funding, more taxpayers to shoulder the costs of levies and bonds, and more staff members. 
• Home to the highest-paid superintendent in the state. Superintendent Derek Bub currently makes about $215,000 — more than any other superintendent, including Debbie Critchfield (who makes about $129,000).
• Home to a higher percentage of students from middle-to-high income families than the state average. West Ada’s percentage of students from low income families is 23%, as compared to the state average of 40%.
• Otherwise comprised of a student population that is comparable to state averages. (See chart below).

*including only groups that comprise 1% or more of the population

Source: idahoschools.org

West Ada is not:

• The biggest spender. It spends about $6,600 per students, as compared to the statewide average of $9,800 spent per students.
• The district with the highest-paid teachers. Its teachers make about $57K — just above the state average of $55K. Neighboring Boise pays its teachers an average of $67K.
• The district with the most experienced teachers. About 72% of West Ada teachers have six or more years of experience, as compared to 65% statewide, and about 81% at Boise School District.
• The district with the highest teacher retention rates. West Ada’s retention rate is about 84%, as compared to the state average of 87.9% and Boise’s rate of 85%.

Marcus Myers, the district’s chief academic officer, and Bub both acknowledged that West Ada’s size gives it some advantages — like a low tax rate. 

The district’s large staff is another plus. For example, Bub’s cabinet includes unique positions that don’t exist in every district, such as these:

But Myers said the most important game-changers are not staff or resources, but belief systems and district culture: “You have to create a culture of instructional changes based on what kids do and don’t know, and then you have to create a tool to measure that along the way.”

West Ada’s tool: frequent checks for learning.

How teachers turn data into a learning opportunity

Throughout the year, West Ada students take practice (or formative) tests to create data on their learning progress. Those practice check-ins are not required by the state, but West Ada still requires them district-wide. 

“We don’t rely on just … the data that tells us where we landed the plane at the end of the trip,” Myers said. “We make sure that we’re following that progress along the way.”

After each round of practice tests, teachers have a scheduled PD day to analyze the data — because otherwise, the numbers would be meaningless, Kelly Davies, director of assessment and achievement, said. 

“It’s in the action that you see results, and action has to come from the analysis of data,” Davies said. 

And data is just part of the picture; teachers’ relationships with students fill in the rest of the story.

“The numbers on the page only say so much; there’s the story of the student as well,” Davies said. “The teacher has that with them, and that will never be something that can be on a spreadsheet.”

After evaluating the full story and multiple data points, teachers can then decide next steps based on student needs.

Admittedly, it’s a time-consuming process and it requires buy-in. 

Part of that is changing the culture around tests, Myers said, and getting teachers and students to see them as tools to help learning, instead of tasks done to comply with laws. 

“Every possible check we can have along the way — if it leads to better results — everybody wants that win, right?” Myers said. 

District-level administrators also analyze student achievement data monthly. If multiple data points identify a low-performing school or class, they send in a team of what are called “consultants,” or instructional coaches, to help support the teacher and get students back on track.

West Ada teachers are constantly learning from data — and from each other.

Learning tailored to teachers: Professional development that works (or is adjusted when it doesn’t)

In West Ada, professional development for teachers stands out for what it’s NOT:

• It’s not a “sit-and-get” lecture style information session
• It doesn’t feature national (and usually pricey) speakers 
• They are not one-size-fits-all, giant PD sessions that the entire district gets, regardless of content area or grade level

Instead, they are interactive sessions designed and tailored for specific small groups, and they’re often led by in-house teachers and staff. 

For example, teachers at Prospect Elementary participated in a scavenger hunt at one staff training — they were sent to look at their peers’ classrooms, paying attention to how they wrote and displayed what are called learning intentions and success criteria. 

Breaking down jargon: Learning intentions and success criteria
The terms, well-known to teachers, basically mean the learning goal (what students should know or be able to do by the end of a lesson or unit) and how progress toward that goal can be measured. The idea behind them is that students will be able to self-assess and understand where they are in their learning journey. 

“That was fantastic, and it was very well-received,” Gwenda Venecia, the school’s principal, said. “Now we have more ideas for how to write these more effectively and impact students with them.”

That’s the kind of professional development that’s worthwhile for teachers.

“We want it to be very applicable to what they’re doing,” Marcus Myers, the district’s chief academic officer, said. 

“It really comes down to this idea that what a teacher does in the classroom really matters for the longevity of students and we need to consistently work to improve our craft, just like in any business,” Bub said. “We always need to strive to be better.”

And Patricia Vandenberg, a math coordinator in the curriculum and instruction department, said it’s important that the training isn’t based on the newest teaching fad, but on practices that have been around for a while, been proven effective, and are well-researched. Letting teachers slowly adapt to new techniques is important too. 

“In education, we are guilty of having too many initiatives, like every year is a new initiative and a new focus,” she said. “It comes down to going slow to go fast.”

Basically, the district strives to run its training the same way they would ask a teacher to run a classroom — with great instructional strategies, clear goals, and engaged learners, Myers said.

And every time teachers have training, they also get at least a few hours to “digest what they’re learning” and think about how they can incorporate it into their teaching. 

And teachers need to know they aren’t being asked to overhaul their entire way of doing things — just incorporate little bits and pieces at a time. 

“When we’re talking about changing habits, it takes small steps and being consistent,” Vandenberg said.

Myers said staff meetings are shifting away from traditional informational rundowns, and toward staff members sharing instructional strategies. That way, teachers can get little bite-size PD more often than the dedicated four days a year. 

Admittedly, some professional development sessions are “flops,” Bub said. 

“But we need to hear that as well, so we don’t repeat that. We make sure that when teachers walk out of our professional development, they’re 1% better than they were the day before.”

The district’s leaders are also expected to keep learning — in part by getting into classrooms more often, without letting paperwork or meetings get in the way.

Back to class: Principals in the classroom, learning alongside students

Last spring, the district initiated what it calls “instructional rounds.” 

Here’s how it works:

• One principal hosts a handful of other administrators or leaders at his/her school. Together, they visit a teacher’s classroom and watch and observe the instruction, then discuss and reflect on what they saw.
• It’s a process that takes up to three hours. 
• Principals and school leaders participate in this two to three times a year.

This is different than a typical observation, which usually involves one administrator sitting in on a class as part of a formal teacher evaluation, for a few reasons:

• • Multiple administrators from various schools are present.
  • The teacher volunteers to host the administrators and knows when they’ll be coming.
  • The administrators are not focusing on what the teacher could do better, but on what they the leaders could improve based on what they saw.

It seems simple, but the change is having an impact already. 

Leaders are telling Vandenberg that it’s the best professional development they’ve ever had. 

And it’s not just principals — the district’s highest-level administrators, including its chief academic officer and superintendent — participate, too. 

“I don’t want school leaders that don’t know what it’s like to be in the classroom.” — Derek Bub, West Ada Superintendent

“I don’t want school leaders that don’t know what it’s like to be in the classroom,” said Bub, who said he visits classrooms at least three days a week. 

Vandenberg got the idea for the practice from a book: “I was really inspired. I’ve never read a book so fast.” 

She originally spearheaded the program, piloted last spring, to help improve math instruction. But then participants were quickly asking to expand it to all content areas — which the district is doing this year. 

The sit-ins help leaders better understand what good instruction looks like in each subject (because best practices for teaching senior-level math are likely a bit different than they are for teaching freshman-level English) and in turn, they’re able to provide better feedback to teachers. 

“Teachers are just in the thick of it,” Vandenberg said. “They’re in the trenches battling it out, and they need leaders that can tell them one small thing they can work on, give them a different perspective, and help them refine their craft.”

And every six weeks, administrators get another training opportunity — they spend a half day at the district headquarters, participating in professional development designed just for them. 

West Ada didn’t have to reinvent the wheel, but they did anyway: Defining what great teaching look like, in their own terms

Many schools use the Charlotte Danielson framework to determine what great teaching looks like. The framework includes pre-written checklists and goals that teachers can use to better their craft, and that principals can use to evaluate them. 

West Ada leaders didn’t have to reinvent that wheel — but they did anyway, generating their own descriptions and benchmarks for effective instruction. Plus, building the checklist became a valuable learning opportunity in and of itself. 

“There’s power in learning by doing, so when we build it together, there’s a level of ownership,” Myers said. 

The checklists are based on established research, but are tailored to West Ada’s district and goals. Here’s what one looks like. 

So while the Charlotte Danielson framework, for example, focuses on what the teacher is doing, West Ada’s checklist also focuses on what students are doing. 

District leaders have also built their own best practice guidelines called “foundational commitments,” which guide instructional efforts (see below). This year’s focus is on best first instruction. 

Now teachers, principals, and administrators can use a shared language and be on the same page. 

After all, students’ futures are at stake.

“We have an obligation, an imperative, a responsibility to make sure that our kids are successful after high school,” Bub said. “That’s what makes our graduation so exciting — we collectively believe that our students have those opportunities when they walk across that stage.”

Data Analyst Randy Schrader contributed to this report. 

The College of Western Idaho could launch a bachelor’s program in business administration next fall, if the State Board of Education signs on.

The program — known as a bachelor of applied science degree — would meld academic and career-technical classes, and could allow students to receive a degree for about $20,000 in tuition costs.

“That may move more people into a skilled workforce,” CWI President Gordon Jones said Thursday afternoon, after trustees unanimously endorsed the new program.

The four-year degree would be a first at CWI, and a rarity in Idaho education. There is only one such program in the state — a College of Southern Idaho program in “operations management,” focused on the food processing industry.

Applied degrees are not uncommon nationally, however. Community colleges in 23 states offer four-year degrees, CWI officials say. And 21 community colleges in neighboring states offer applied bachelor’s degrees in business-related fields.

Boise State University, the University of Idaho and Idaho State University all offer bachelor’s programs in business administration. But CWI officials believe their program would fill a unique niche — serving older, non-traditional students; students who want to parlay their CTE credits into an academic degree; and high school graduates who are worried about the cost of four-year college.

“(These students) are not likely the traditional four-year bachelor of arts student profile,” said CWI board chair Molly Lenty.

The CWI program would open “more access and opportunity for students,” she said.

In a lengthy resolution endorsing the new program, trustees pointed to a workforce demand. Within the past year, employers within 100 miles of CWI’s Nampa campus posted 18,000 listings for business-related jobs requiring a bachelor’s degree.

In the future, Jones said CWI could branch into bachelor’s programs in two other high-demand fields: teaching and health care.

For the time being, the focus is on business administration.

CWI has cash in hand to cover the $500,000 startup costs, without going to the Legislature for a line item, Jones said. The college has master’s- and doctoral-trained faculty on staff who can take on the program, and curriculum is in hand.

The biggest hurdle is State Board approval.

The State Board is likely to take up the proposal in December.

But in a March 3 letter to House Education Committee members, Executive Director Matt Freeman said applied bachelor’s degree proposals “would be viewed favorably” by the State Board.

In the letter, Freeman noted that the State Board had already adopted a series of criteria to review proposals from CWI, CSI and the College of Eastern Idaho. The proposed programs would need to meet the board’s criteria, and meet local workforce needs.

“Let’s go!” cheered the high school students of the Fire Service II class, clapping as their classmates quickly pulled in over 50 feet of rope, climbed up and down a ladder, then ascended three flights of stairs, all while wearing 60 pounds of gear.

Thanks to a $400,000 grant from the state of Idaho, students enrolled in the fire services program in West Ada School District will receive 29 items of hands-on firefighting equipment like a thermal imaging camera, combat fire hoses and a forcible entry container. Course instructor Kent Hemseri, a retired firefighter with 30 years of experience, says the grant will empower students through exposure to vital firefighting techniques, preparing them for future careers.   

The program is offered by West Ada’s Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathway, which has over 20 options for students looking for skills-based programs. The grant received by the fire service program is part of Gov. Brad Little’s “Leading Idaho” initiative, and comes at a time when state superintendent Debbie Critchfield is also prioritizing increases in CTE funding, hoping to prepare students for life after high school.

Hemseri paused often during the training to motivate the students yelling, “take your time,” “use your legs not your back” and “one step at a time.”

Currently 140 students from seven different high schools participate in fire services courses including, Orientation to Police, Fire, & Emergency Medical Services, Fire Service I and Fire Service II. Hemseri explained that students who finish the program walk away prepared to attend a fire academy after high school and also receive certifications that improve their resumes through organizations like the National Wildlife Coordination Group (NWCG) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Students can also choose to complete Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) training.

Students interact with mentors from partnering fire departments who answer questions, take them on ride-alongs and assist in teaching during skills days. Additionally, guest speakers visit and introduce class members to other firefighting adjacent career options.

Hemseri says he focuses on teamwork, placing students in a formal chain of command and rotating positions so each has a chance to lead. “The fire service is all about teamwork. There’s no independent action…. you all have to work together for a common goal.”

Instructors slowly introduce students to skills. “There’s an old adage in the fire department,” Hemseri described. “First you crawl, then you walk, then you run.” He emphasized his priority of student safety while exposing them to as much as possible to prepare students for future careers.

The students participating stayed engaged throughout the training and cheered each other on, even once they completed their turn. Student Hayden Collins noted the contrast between regular classes and his firefighting classes. “Here I’m outside, learning how to do what I want to do in the future,” he remarked.

Students even team up from different CTE courses. According to their website, West Ada’s CTE program instructors teach almost 9,000 students per year. Hemseri explained that the construction class built a roof prop so students could (after careful training) use a saw and learn how to ventilate a roof in case of a fire.

The fire services program also helps address gender disparities in the male dominated field of firefighting. According to the National Fire Protection Association, in 2020 just 9% of firefighters were female. Hemseri explained that the physical demands of firefighting can intimidate anyone considering the career. When students get to try out skills in a low stress environment, they can see if firefighting is the right fit. Plus, mentorship with female firefighters encourages female students like Andra Samson, who reflected, “Okay, another female did it, I can do it too.”

Samson plans on working on a hand crew during the summer fighting wildfires, and then going to college and studying firefighting before applying to work at a fire department.

Though the rapid growth of Treasure Valley has opened more firefighting positions, according to Hemseri, the fire service remains extremely competitive. When asked what was most overwhelming about becoming a firefighter, the students mentioned the competitive nature of the career. However, student Chance Keats explained the courses he is taking help him feel more prepared. “[In] this class, we do certifications…every couple weeks and…if you show them to someone that you’re trying to be hired by, they may [say], ‘Oh, this [guy] has taken time to try to get to know more about the profession.’”

Keats explained that even if he does not become a full-time firefighter, the program has taught him valuable life skills. “Think about the obstacle course we’re doing. That’ll teach you how to be mentally tough. And it can get you ready for other obstacles in life, even if you don’t become a firefighter.”

The filing deadline to run for a school board seat was Sept. 8. The withdrawal deadline is Sept. 22. Idaho Education News is collecting the names of candidates for each school board election. The following represents some of what was available today.  

West Bonner

All three West Bonner incumbents face opponents in their bid to retain their seats. In zone one, Alan Galloway of Priest River is running against incumbent Margaret Hall. In zone three, Elizabeth Glazier of Priest River will face incumbent Troy Reinbold. In zone five, Kathy Nash of Blanchard faces incumbent Carlyn Barton.

West Bonner trustees have been in the spotlight recently for the August recall election of two board leaders. In the next four months, Hall, Reinbold and Barton are tasked with appointing two new trustees who will serve out those terms. Trustees will meet as a board Wednesday for the first time since the election. 

The two open seats will not be part of the November election, because they have to be appointed, confirmed Bonner County Clerk Mike Rosedale.

The voting precincts for zone one are Blue Lake, East Priest River, Lamb Creek, Oldtown and Priest Lake; for zone three, they are Clagstone and Edgemere; in zone five, they are Oldtown and Spirit Valley.

In the previous election four years ago, there were 322 votes cast in zone one and 230 votes in zone three. Barton ran unopposed. In those three districts, there are 5,310 registered voters. Go to this link to register.

Coeur d’Alene

Coeur d’Alene’s school board has two seats up for election. In both races, there are multiple candidates scheduled to run. 

In zone two, current trustee Casey Morrisroe is not seeking reelection. Voters will chose from candidates James “Jimmy” McAndrew, Yasmin Harris, Paul Mahlow and Mike Stavish; in zone three, incumbent trustee Heather Tenbrink will face Matt Blatt and Jeremy DeChaine.

Nampa

Zone 1 — Jay Dufffy, Stephanie Bins

Zone 2 — Adam Schasel, David Jennings

Caldwell

Zone 2 — Ray Horrell, Manuel Godina

Zone 3 — Nicole Trakel, Travis Manning

Zone 4 — Niccole Hyland, Andrew Butler

Vallivue

Zone 3 — Toni Brineegar

Zone 4 — Brian Bishop, Paul Tierney

Zone 5 —  Amy Johnson

Kuna

Zone 1 — Joy Thomas, Hillary Lowe

Zone 2 — Kristi Hardy, James Grant

Zone 5 — Russell Johnson, Michael Thornton

Melba

Zone 2 – Ryan Segar

Zone 3 — Jolene Gould

Zone 4 — Travis Christiansen

Marsing

Zone 2 — Chad Showalter

Zone 4 — Sean Rowley

Middleton

Zone 3 — Jakob Dempsey

Zone 5 — Derek Moore

West Ada

Zone 2 — Susan Schuetz, Lucas Baclayon

Zone 4 — David Binetti, Miguel Deluna, Mariel Gates

Zone 5 — Tom Moore, Rene Ozuna, Jeremy Cutler

Lakeland

Zone 1 — Randi Bain, Kyle Olmstead

Zone 2 — Ramona Grissom, Cherish Hansen

Zone 3 — Sheila Holfeltz, Michelle Thompson

Wilder

Zone 3 — Jaime Ponce

Zone 4 — Bree Walker

Plummer-Worley
Zone 2 — Tammy Gauthier, Laura Laumatia

Zone 4 — Nicky James. Jan Mitchell

Zone 5 — Brian Clark, Chris Smith

Zone 6 — Payton Hodgson, Marlow Thompson

Kellogg

Zone 3 — Sam Gibbons, Sarah Frohlich

Zone 4 — Alexa Griffin, David Hernandez

Zone 5 — Felicia Cassidy, Melanie Carter, John Schroeder

Emmett (no designated zones voters pick three)

No Zones — Nita Barnard, Mona Barnes, Adam Buck, Tim Brady, Janet Drake, Mike Garner, Derrick Oxnam, Patty Puschmann, Qandryel Romrell, D’on M Waltermine

Genesee

Zone 1 — Jim Hermann

Zone 3 — Kelley A. Porter

Kendrick

Zone 1 — Rone Ireland, Steven McDowell

Zone 4 — Justin Cowly, Ryan Lawrence

Potlatch

Zone 2 — Jessica Scholfield

Zone 4 — Ryan Becker

Troy

Zone 2 — Kyle Osborn

Zone 4 — Pamela Hilliard

Zone 5 — Wendy Fredrickson

Whitepine

Zone 2 — Mandy Kirk

Zone 3 — Brittany Griffan

Zone 5 — Beverly Clark

Culdesac

Zone 4 — None

Zone 5 — None

Highland

Zone 1 — None

Zone 3 — Michelle Mendenhall

Zone 4 — None

Teton

Zone 1 — Natalie Kashi

Zone 2 — Jennie Beach, Michael Adams

Zone 5 — Jared Killpack, Martin Balben. William McMahon

Twin Falls

Zone 2 — Brad Breland, Heidi Tubbs

Zone 4 — Jonathan Lord

Zone 5 — Heidi Casdorph

American Falls

Zone 1 — Kamren Kompin

Zone 3 — Jessalee Smith

Rockland

Zone 1 — Marshall Ralphs

Zone 2 — Jordan O’Brien

Arbon Valley

Zone 1 — Ashlee Fitch

Zone 3 — Zachary Tarbet

EdNews Data Analyst Randy Schrader contributed to this report. 

The error is being blamed on an algorithm problem.

Teachers typically use IRI results to guide their instructional next steps. Now, teachers are back in the classroom either unaware that spring testing results were inaccurate or questioning whether the new recalculated results are reliable. 

The State Department of Education releases an IRI-based report card in July each year to show reading scores for some 90,000 Idaho students. This year’s public report has been delayed and won’t be released until October.

“Our preliminary analysis indicates that over 90% of Idaho districts and charter schools had one or more students who were affected by (the) corrections,” wrote Ryan Cantrell, chief deputy superintendent, in a letter to administrators last week.

Ensuring that all Idaho students learn to read by third grade is one the state’s top priorities and accurate scores are critical to that $72 million-a-year early literacy effort. The SDE relies on IRI results to measure reading achievement. Imagination Station, the vendor that administers Idaho’s statewide reading assessment, is beginning its sixth year providing a screener, diagnostic, monitoring progress, automatic scoring, and school, district and state reporting.

“We are assessing the impact,” said Scott Graf, the SDE’s communications director.

Despite a nearly four-month delay caused by the mathematical error, Istation won’t be penalized. The Dallas-based company is set to receive $723,570 this year, according to the SDE.

Once the problem was identified, Istation recalculated the data and provided updated results for state validation in late August. That process is currently underway and expected to be completed in the fall. 

The IRI is a norm-referenced assessment that provides educators with a way to measure reading progress. Students test in the fall and again in the spring. Those results indicate how well Idaho students read in relation to students of their age or grade. They also measure growth over the school year. 

“I think the more immediate concern is that if those scores aren’t right for some of those students, you’re not getting an accurate picture of where that student is,” said Greg Wilson, state superintendent Debbie Critchfield’s chief of staff.

IRI reading results are released in proficiency tiers: at grade level, near grade level or below grade level.

The algorithm problem created a situation where the original scores were lower than they actually were, Graf said. The inaccurate 2023 data was never publicly released statewide. 

But before the statewide release, educators have access to the results from the Istation website. That’s when educators started asking questions.

“They said, ‘Hey, this isn’t making sense. I’m looking at Johnny’s scores. Johnny scored proficient in every subcategory. But he’s not proficient overall. Mathematically, that doesn’t add up,” Cantrell recalled. “(Istation) came back to us and said, ‘guys, we found an error in the way we re-normed the data for 2023 and it’s going to require us to recalculate all of Idaho’s 2023 scores for the spring.” 

Both parents and educators are impacted by the delay

As Idaho Education News repeatedly requested the results, the release date of the statewide IRI report card has been set and changed multiple times this summer. The SDE now expects to release the full report in early October, months behind the release in past years.

For now, parents are unable to accurately evaluate their child’s reading progress last school year, nor can they gauge the teacher’s or school’s performance. The level of growth a student achieves in reading between fall and spring is one of several outcomes measured by the test results. For superintendents, there is one less tool to evaluate school and teacher performance. 

The distribution model for half of the state’s early literacy money is contingent on scores. But that distribution doesn’t come until later in the school year, so the error will not have an impact, Wilson said.

“I think we’re in a good place,” Wilson said.

This is an abnormality that’s not acceptable, even for one or two kids, let alone 200 or 300, said Cantrell.

The problem started in the spring of 2023. Every four or five years, norm-referenced data has to be re-normed. During that re-norming process, an algorithm error was introduced.

“So let’s say I take a test and I get an 83. Well, an 83 might put me in the 50th percentile. But what we found is that their algorithm had an error, so my 83 really should have put me in the 52nd percentile or the 53rd percentile, because it’s norm-reference data,” Cantrell explained. 

“We’ve been using Istation now for more than five years. And this is the first issue we’ve run into in five years. And they fixed it. They corrected it on their own. Everybody’s human — mistakes are going to be made. Sometimes the best we can do is fix it, be transparent about it and then move on,” he said.

He’ll be sworn in at the Sept. 18 board meeting.

Su is the assistant director of operations for the Meridian Library District, and has children attending Nampa schools. He was one of six candidates interviewed by the board on Aug. 23. Both Wednesday’s meeting and the candidate interviews can be viewed on the district’s YouTube.

Several trustees said Su’s experience navigating controversial conversations and sometimes tumultuous environments in the Meridian libraries would be an asset to the board.

Between COVID-19 polices to policies on book restriction and gender identity, the Nampa board has navigated its fair share of turmoil over the past three years.

And trustee Jeff Kirkman said Su was on his list of top candidates because he can provide “healthy disagreement,” and he brings a unique perspective and has skin in the game.

After around 30 minutes of discussion Wednesday evening, trustees submitted their ballots to board clerk Krissy LaMont, who relayed that Su was the top choice for all trustees.

Trustees then unanimously voted to appoint Su to the board.

He will be sworn into office on Sept. 18. His seat expires in December 2025.

Trustees selected Bennion in an unanimous vote Tuesday evening, after a series of 30-minute interviews with four applicants.

Bennion is a product of the Boise School District, and currently serves as vice president of student affairs and Dean of Students at the College of Idaho. He has three kids — two have graduated from Boise schools, and one is a student at Boise High.

His passion for the Boise district is what led his desire to join the board, he told trustees during his interview Tuesday.

The six trustees — Dave Wagers, Maria Greeley, Beth Oppenheimer, Shiva Rajbhandari, Nancy Gregory and Elizabeth Langley — shot Bennion a series of questions about transparency, diversity, success and campaigning during his interview Tuesday.

Bennion told the board he intends to run for election in a year. He feels comfortable collaborating with board members and the different stakeholders in the Boise district, and values representation and equity in the district and on the board, he said. His goals for the board align with the mission and values of the district, and the board’s strategic plan, which outlines priorities for trustees moving forward.

After interviewing Bennion, along with fellow candidates Kenneth Howell, Jennifer Pierce and Darla Mitchell, trustees thanked the applicants for their willingness to be a part of the district. The pool is a “credit to the community” and a testament to the administration and staff at Boise schools, trustees said.

“We’re very lucky to have a great pool of candidates,” said Oppenheimer.

Each board member cast one individual vote. After the first round of ballots, Bennion emerged as the choice.

“I’m honored to serve the district and then to work collaboratively with the current board members and the superintendent’s office, and just make sure that our teachers and students are as well served as they can possibly be,” Bennion told EdNews Tuesday evening.

He will be officially sworn in at the board’s Sept. 11 meeting.

Their action ends a months-long struggle between Durst and the State Board. Durst was unwilling to apply because of his belief that two superintendents cannot hold emergency provisional certifications at the same time, a claim dispelled by the State Department of Education. 

The State Board notified West Bonner last week in a letter that Durst does not hold the proper superintendent certification and is therefore unqualified to work in Idaho as a superintendent.

The “codes strongly suggest your board’s decision to allow an uncertified individual to serve as superintendent violates Idaho law,” according to the letter obtained by Idaho Education News.

West Bonner trustees held an emergency meeting Tuesday night to address the State Board’s Aug. 23 deadline to submit a written response, explaining how the district will correct the violation. 

Trustees plan to comply. Durst was instructed to write that response Wednesday and provide a copy to trustees for review prior to submission to the State Board. The letter will confirm that Durst is applying for certification this month.

“Our response to the State Board of Education needs to be reviewed by the full board before it goes in, and the signature on that needs to be that of the chair, not Mr. Durst,” trustee Margaret Hall said.

They voted 3-1 in favor of compelling Durst to apply “for the purpose of serving as West Bonner County School District superintendent for the 2023-2024 school year by a date no later than Aug. 31.” Chairman Keith Rutledge, vice chairwoman Susan Brown and trustee Troy Reinbold voted in favor, while trustee Hall voted against it; trustee Carlyn Barton abstained, citing the meeting’s lack of proper notice.

“I’m abstaining because unfortunately this meeting did not give us 24-hours notice. This is an emergency meeting but doesn’t qualify under the emergency Idaho code. And so I will be abstaining from this, because this all should be null and void,” Barton said.

Meanwhile, Hall questioned additional language added to the motion that could change Durst’s contract. It appears that once he applies for the certification, a previous requirement in his contract may be nullified.

“I think it’s inappropriate that other board members have not seen what you’re actually reading in terms of the motions going on,” Hall said to Brown.

She then asked Brown to reread the specific language twice.

Brown said, “That any provision related to this certification in the superintendent’s agreement shall be null and void and hereby fulfilled in its entirety. I think it’s pretty self explanatory.”

“For clarification, is that striking other designated qualifications? Is that changing item B?” Hall asked.

Hall read the item from his contract: “Item B states the board shall retain the option to immediately terminate this contract should the superintendent be required by Idaho code to obtain and maintain an Idaho superintendent certification or provisional certification … So I need clarification if that’s what you’re referring to?”

“That is correct,” Brown replied.

After the 3-1 vote, Barton said, “And again, I’m going to abstain because we didn’t have enough notice. Nothing should happen today. This whole meeting should be null and void.”

To view Durst’s contract, please use this link. The screenshot below highlights item B of his contract.

The district declared a one-year emergency

Trustees passed a motion declaring an emergency pursuant to Idaho code 33-1203 and said the emergency shall be in full force from Aug. 31 until June 30, 2024. The emergency declaration will be added as an addendum to Durst’s contract. 

Brown, Rutledge and Reinbold voted in favor; Barton abstained and Hall voted against the motion. “I will say no to the matter,” she said.

When the letter is approved and sent to the State Board Wednesday and Durst makes his official provisional certificate application, it seems that West Bonner trustees will have met the state’s imposed deadline.

There were at least 10,711 students placed on charter school waitlists this school year. Idaho Education News requested waitlists from all Idaho charters for this story and approximately three-fourths responded, so the total would likely be higher if all schools responded.

“There are still far too many students sitting on a waitlist for their school of choice,” said Jason Bransford, CEO of Gem Prep Innovation Schools, which embarked on a multi-year expansion, resulting in seven campuses and one slated to open in Ammon in 2025.

“This is an indication that parents have a vision for the future of their children that they believe a charter school can help them fulfill. Just looking at Gem Prep schools, when you combine the actual enrollments and waitlists together, we find a trend of increasing interest year over year,” Bransford said.

Though Idaho charters are publicly funded and open to any student, enrollment is limited and awarded via lotteries. Once a school’s seats are full, those who don’t get in either go on a waitlist or go somewhere else, often returning to traditional neighborhood schools.

Today there are 73 charter schools serving about 30,000 students. With a total of 314,000 K-12 students, charters serve 9.5% of all public school students in Idaho.

“The 10,711 students on waitlists only represent those who live near enough to a charter to apply and have not lost hope in applying,” Bransford said. “There are countless others who would apply but there are no charters in their community. Others have given up applying, because their child has been waitlisted for several consecutive years in their school of choice.” 

Five years ago, charters served 7.6% of the public school population, or 22,000 students. The nearly 2% increase was the result of 16 schools opening their doors over that period, averaging about 4.2 per year, or about a 5% growth rate.

Five new charters are planning to open this school year: Alpine Academy Chubbuck, Promise Academy Caldwell, Gem Prep Twin Falls, Kootenai Classical Academy and Pinecrest Academy Lewiston. Once these schools are fully open, the state will have 78 charters serving nearly 10% of the student population.

Here’s a look at the 10 longest waitlists, according to the school administrators:

• Liberty Charter School in Nampa: 2,032 students waiting.
• Victory Charter School in Nampa: 1,473 students waiting.
• Vision Charter School in Caldwell: 1,357 students waiting.
• North Star Charter School in Eagle: 824 students waiting.
• Legacy Charter School in Nampa: 684 students waiting.
• Compass Charter School in Meridian: 515 students waiting.
• Elevate Academy Inc in Caldwell: 412 students waiting.
• Alturas International Academy in Idaho Falls: 377 students waiting.
• Mosaics Public School in Caldwell: 336 students waiting.
• Taylor’s Crossing Charter School in Idaho Falls: 335 students waiting.

This article contains information contributed by Idaho Ed News data analyst Randy Schrader.

So she pushed legislation that will pump $45 million tax dollars in a program designed to generate training programs in rural Idaho.

So far, her plan is working.

About 73% of the grant applications aimed at boosting career technical education (CTE) programs have come from remote areas, like Potlatch, Firth and Murtaugh.

That’s where the state superintendent hoped these grant funds would have an impact. “This program positions Idahoans to create workforce solutions that are responsive and tailor-made for their area’s individual needs,” Critchfield wrote in a recent press release.

The state’s $45 million Idaho Career Ready Students (ICRS) Program aims to meet the workforce needs of rural communities, although any school is eligible to apply. The career technical education initiative for grades 7-12 began accepting grant applications in July.

High school CTE programs prepare Idaho’s youth for high-skill, in-demand careers. There are six pathways:

• Agriculture, food and natural resources.
• Business and marketing education.
• Engineering and technology education.
• Family and consumer sciences, and human services.
• Health professions and public safety.
• And trades and industry.

Since the application period opened, $22.5 million dollars of requests have reached the state, which is about half the funds allocated. There is no set application deadline, so project requests are being accepted.

The 11-member ICRS council will be making funding decisions on Sept. 6, then quarterly to review applications.

Twenty-five out of the current 34 applications came from a rural school. Portneuf Valley Technical Education and Career Campus in Chubbuck has the largest request and Aberdeen High School made the smallest.

In terms of total dollars, the following three applications were the largest submitted. All three involve construction or renovation projects.

• $6.5 million — Pocatello Chubbuck School District: Portneuf Valley Technical Education and Career Campus plans to complete the remodel of the existing 78,000 square foot Allstate building and add 20,000 additional square feet to the east side of the building to house welding, construction, and firefighting. When the building is fully open, there will be 22 classrooms and three shops. This project will both expand existing programs and add new programs.
• $6 million — Minidoka School District: Minico High School’s project is to construct an agriculture science and welding building to boost ag sciences, welding, manufacturing, engineering, construction and mechanics classes. Welding has 300 students requesting classes each year, but a 180-student capacity. Minico’s Future Farmers of America chapter is the largest in Idaho and 1,100 students select an ag class as their first elective choice. Community donations have topped $750,00 and two local companies have committed to providing a $200,000 overhead hoist system.
• $5 million — West Ada School District: Owyhee High School plans to expand and modernize its CTE programs in construction and welding fabrication. Through a partnership with the ICRS grant money and industry support, they will leverage a 40,000 square foot $1.8 million building donation (which is adjacent to the high school) to expand and revolutionize the educational infrastructure. This venture will reduce the number of students turned away from ongoing programs, create homes for homeless veterans and drive economic growth.

The following three applications were the smallest submitted. Each helps students acquire useful skills for the workplace.

• $32,000 — Marsh Valley School District: Marsh Valley High School plans to expand its existing welding program with the purchase of six TIG welding systems. In the Marsh Valley area, qualified welders are needed for agricultural, commercial and government positions. This program will increase the number of prepared candidates for these positions.
• $6,000 — Hansen School District: Hansen Junior/Senior High School plans to purchase equipment for a good science lab and food equipment to learn industry standards. Students will learn the operation and science behind food production. Over 15,000 jobs in the Magic Valley are in food processing, food science research and development.
• $5,500 — Aberdeen School District: Aberdeen High School plans to open a student store, offering an on-site location to replenish supplies. Running the store will provide real-world experience with business operations, marketing, inventory, cash exchanges and sales. The money will be used to acquire equipment and merchandise.

Examples of acceptable expenses in this grant program include capital costs needed to upgrade and expand existing programs or construction costs associated with building programs, like architectural and design fees; and investments to develop programs specific to a local region and job market.

School districts and charters can apply for the funds here. The ICRS program was approved by the Legislature earlier this year and signed into law by Gov. Brad Little on March 31.

The candidates — Paul Bennion, Kenneth Howell, Darla Mitchell and Jennifer Pierce — were selected by trustees in an anonymous vote during the board’s Friday afternoon work session.

• Darla Mitchell: Mitchell is a parent of three students in Boise schools, and serves as a K-2 Girl Scouts founder and troop leader in Boise. According to the resume she submitted to the board, Mitchell works as the director of strategic markets for Kyndryl, Inc. One of her top concerns in the district is equitable access to education.
• Jennifer Pierce: Pierce is a professor of geosciences at Boise State University, and has two daughters in the Boise district. Since her daughters started school, Pierce has volunteered with the district and and engaged in volunteer K-12 outreach. One of her top priorities is supporting student success in science in math.
• Kenneth Howell: Howell has served on boards for institutions throughout the state, including Idaho Public Television, the College of Idaho and the Downtown Boise Association. He attended the College of Idaho and University of Idaho and currently works as a lawyer for Hawley Troxell. If selected as a trustee, Howell would prioritize fiscal responsibility and student and teacher success.
• Paul Bennion: Bennion serves as the Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students at the College of Idaho. He graduated from Centennial High School and received a doctorate from the University of Idaho. Bennion’s priorities for the Boise district align with the board’s strategic plan.

To read the candidate applications in full, visit the district website.

Life experience, alignment with district goals and values, connections to the community and district and willingness to run a future campaign factored into the board members’ votes. Trustees Maria Greeley and Beth Oppenheimer added that they were wary of candidates with clear agendas.

Bennion, Howell, Mitchell and Pierce are scheduled to participate in interviews with trustees on August 29 between 4-6.

The board will appoint and swear in a new trustee by the September board meeting.

HAILEY — Experts say reading influences every aspect of your life, so a group of tutors and committed administrators set out each summer to ensure multilingual first graders receive the early literacy instruction needed for their long-term success.

That intervention is increasingly needed as Idaho’s foreign-born population grows. The American Immigration Council reports that one in 12 Idaho workers is an immigrant, who likely leads a household.

School districts like Blaine and Vallivue experiencing an increasing number of multilingual children are discovering new strategies to help them achieve reading performance. Blaine County’s assessment scores show that many students who participated in their reading program last summer advanced from behind grade level to at grade level.

At a round, wooden table in the Alturas Elementary School library, six-year-old Jasmine’s expressive face looked determined as she sounded out the words “and” or “get.”

Every once in a while, she would interject a little Spanish for clarification.

“Sound it out,” her tutor encouraged.

 “Ahh-nn-d. Ah-n-d. And,” Jasmine said. ‘G-ehh-t. G-e-t. Get.”

A quick high-five and they were off to the next lesson.

Jasmine was decoding words: to see a string of letters, match those to the letter sound and then blend those sounds together to read a written word. She was one of 40 Blaine County School District first graders enrolled in Lee Pesky’s summer literacy pods for English learners (EL).

EL students are considered at-risk because they speak a language at home other than English, and whose difficulties in speaking, reading, writing or understanding English could deny them the ability to achieve classroom success.

The literacy pods “are transformative in the lives of the children we serve,” said Lindy Crawford, executive director of Boise’s Lee Pesky Learning Center.

Blaine County built the intervention program for EL students through private-public partnerships: federal coronavirus money and private donations to non-profit organizations; it funded summer school staff members, curriculum and the learning pods. Lee Pesky’s participation was funded privately through donations and fundraising, according to the district.

“This program can be a model for other districts,” said assistant superintendent Adam Johnson. “Students in this program exit with a new confidence about their ability to succeed in school.”

Children who don’t get off to a good start in reading find it difficult to ever master the process, according to reading researchers. And the strategies that struggling readers use to get by — memorizing words, using context to guess words, or skipping words they don’t know — are the strategies that many beginning readers are taught in school, which makes it harder for many kids to learn how to read.

Developed by their reading specialists, Lee Pesky’s curriculum is effective because it incorporates the science of reading: research- and evidence-based instructional principles. That scientifically based research informs teachers how proficient reading develops — why some have difficulty, and how to effectively assess and teach those with difficulties through prevention and intervention.

The literacy pods have been successful because of the partnerships they have inspired, said Crawford. “School districts are busy places and collaborating with nonprofits takes additional effort. But the districts who have partnered with us are led by forward-thinking professionals who know that there is power in partnerships.”

Johnson agrees: “This program models the strength of engaging community partners into the education process.”

“Relationships are key to our success”

A Lee Pesky program director, Jahziel Hawley-Maldonado recalled that when one student was asked by her tutor what she learned this summer, she responded, “I learned to love you.”

“Relationships are key to our success,” said Crawford.

According to 2022 State Department of Education data, newly enrolled students who spoke something other than English as their first language made up a significant portion of Idaho’s school-aged population growth.

Idaho’s entire school-aged population ticked up slightly at .03%, from 312,643 to 313,641, or about 998 students. In that same period, the state’s EL population increased by 4.5%, or about 805 students. 

The largest percentage increases were in these five districts: Twin Falls enrolled 79 new students, or an increase of 11%; Blaine at 70 students, or 13%; Mountain Home at 36 students, or 16%; Gooding at 37 students, or 26%; and Pocatello at 21 students, or 26.5%.

Because of increases in their EL population over the last few years, Blaine County developed a summer “service component” to their multilingual program. 

Originally not a focal point of the summer learning program, “we have moved language learners higher on the priority list of considerations because we have experienced a significant influx of new-to-the-country students in the district,” Johnson said. 

The elementary learning program is called Summer Bridge Academic Camp, while the middle school is Find Your Element Academic Camp. There were 300 students in grades 1-5 and 55 students in grades 6-8.

Embedded in the summer camp are the literacy pods: one or two students paired up with an enthusiastic tutor, trained by the Lee Pesky center. About half the tutors are bilingual, though it’s not a requirement. This is where that cohort of 40 first graders received additional instruction, because part of their summer camp was spent in the library learning to read.

“I am convinced that one of the most effective tools that we have to help more students reach proficiency is leveraging additional instructional time,” said Johnson.

The Lee Pesky reading curriculum includes 55 lessons that help develop essential reading concepts: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension.

• Phonemic awareness develops sound recognition by listening to and repeating the sounds of letters.
• Letter-sound correspondence is developed by displaying a letter and asking learners to say the sound.
• Word building occurs when words are separated into sound parts and students create words using letter tiles that represent the sounds.
• Word cards require students to sound out the word or read the word.
• Spelling skills are developed when instructors say the words and ask students to identify the sounds they hear and write them on paper. 
• Automatic word recognition is practiced by reading whole words (“the” — “t” “h” “e” — “the”).
• Sentence reading helps students apply all of these skills along with vocabulary they’ve learned.
• Toward the end of the learning process, they attempt to read a story while the instructor asks comprehension questions.

Lee Pesky tutors work with those incoming first graders over the summer but they also “push into our schools in the fall and throughout the school year,” Johnson said. That added instructional time is beneficial for those students, because Blaine County is experiencing an influx of new multilingual students, gaining 200 more out of a total population of 3,300, he said.

“We meet with them to discuss program goals, and we decide who we partner with based on the fit between their summer programming and the population of students they serve,” Crawford said. 

Wood River Valley partnerships launched an innovative early literacy intervention

Maldonado and 10 Lee Pesky tutors were in the field this summer at Alturas elementary and also Vallivue School District’s West Canyon Elementary School, the location of their migrant summer school program. Between the two districts, 62 students completed the program.

The program began in Bellevue, Hailey, Ketchum and Sun Valley in 2020 with approximately eight students as a response to the negative educational effects of COVID. 

“It is now part of our operations and allows us the opportunity to reach more students, partner closely with school districts and other nonprofits, and serve young learners who may otherwise never have found their way to our front door,” Crawford said.

The program is a model for others to emulate.

“The Wood River Valley does have a significant number of non-profit organizations, not every district has access to this depth of local programs, but I think every district has their own unique resources that could allow for a similar public-private collaboration,” Johnson said.

“It is fun to see what can be developed when a diverse group, who prioritize the needs of children, collaborate with each bringing their diverse knowledge, skills and resources to the table,” he said.

Crawford added, “We go in with the goal of teaching students to read and we leave knowing that we have touched their lives on a deep and meaningful level.”

At it’s Aug. 8 board meeting, Vallivue trustees approved the district’s plan to issue the $78 million in September to take advantage of interest rates and to pay this money back over 20 years.

“Getting money now allows us to begin earning interest now,” Piper Sandler managing director Eric Heringer said in a July 11 presentation to Vallivue trustees. “The philosophy is to get it now when we can earn almost 5%, which can generate three to four million in interest to help supplement the bond.”

At the July 11 meeting, board members also approved the Meridian-based Beniton construction company to install the new roof and HVAC systems. Beniton is a long-time Vallivue construction partner.

At the Aug. 8 meeting, board vice-chair Jennifer Cox lauded the Vallivue maintenance crew for making behind the scenes preparations like fireline replacements and constructing HVAC systems at Birch and East Canyon elementary schools.

“We have 13 guys to keep acres and acres of ground to be maintained across the district,” Cox said at the board meeting. “These guys have done so much stuff this summer in addition to grounds work. These are things you don’t see. These aren’t fancy things. These are the things that need to be done that nobody knows. I appreciate that.”

Part of this work is preparation for the two new elementary school sites. In July, the school board unanimously approved Design West to create plans for two new elementary schools on the east and west sides of the district.

August elementary construction updates include an elementary access road declared a private drive, which will allow the district to avoid complex zoning elements required for public roads. Basic survey and groundwork are completed. There is a small section declared a wetland that will have to be resolved before construction begins.

Design West’s goal is to submit plans by November or December so that construction bids can begin to come in by January. Vallivue hopes to open these two new elementary schools by 2025. Board members were careful to note that these large projects take time.

“There are so many logistical hurdles, and so many we don’t even know yet,” trustee Clay Christensen said at the board meeting. “Little tiny blips on the radar that we’ll figure out.”

Because of the collective local interest expressed to the board, the plan going forward is to post a construction timeline on the Vallivue schools website.

In July, the city council granted TVCA’s zoning appeal and remanded the issue back to the zoning department for further negotiations and a public hearing, which was expected to take place on Aug. 8, but has been pushed back to Sept. 12.

Stephen Lambert, executive director of American Classical Schools of Idaho, expressed no concern about the delay.

“We are working through the process with the city in order to satisfy their demands and concerns.  I am hopeful for a positive outcome,” he said.

The zoning commission had originally voted on June 13 to deny a conditional use permit that would have paved the way for a new middle and high school, called the TVCA Upper Campus. That denial was successfully appealed at the city council’s July 10 meeting.

At next month’s zoning meeting, commissioners will likely decide if TVCA’s mitigation strategies and changes to the original plan are adequate. Commissioners originally expressed concern about safe bicycle routes for kids, road extensions, a lack of funding for the costs of road improvements, the negative impact on commercial businesses and the Idaho Transportation Department’s incomplete review.

The estimated $7.5 million campus is planned for 8.62 acres under contract to purchase at the corner of North Arizona Avenue and Northwest 13th Street, southeast of St. Luke’s Clinic. The undeveloped land is zoned commercial and requires the zoning permit for a school campus. The Upper Campus would include three new academic buildings, a gym and cafeteria, a bus parking cul-de-sac, a 150-vehicle parking lot and a soccer field. The new campus would serve grades 7-12.

One of Lambert’s initial concerns was how these delays would affect their funding arrangements. But this week he said, “Our funding is preserved with the closing date adjusted somewhat.”

“The study had to be modified to incorporate the predicted impact of our mitigation strategies to the concerns that were raised.  The updated study has been accepted by the Idaho Transportation Department and the city traffic engineer — and they are working to review it,” Lambert said.

“The notable adjustments all relate to mitigation steps that address concerns in the original traffic study. We were not able to respond to the original set of concerns prior to the original hearing because we did not receive the feedback until the day of the hearing,” he added.

To address those concerns, Lambert estimates the project will cost an additional $1 million to $1.5 million. Rather than $7.5 million, the TVCA upper campus could top $9 million.

“We’re hopeful that that’s going to come pretty quickly. But that’s me being really optimistic,” said Jenn Thompson, the State Board of Education chief policy and government affairs officer.

Like apprentice plumbers and electricians who receive hands-on training and financial support, Idaho’s teacher apprenticeship model is a non-traditional path to certification that removes barriers preventing candidates from becoming educators.

The model creates an affordable pathway for candidates who possess the skill and aptitude but lack a bachelor’s degree, because they receive a salary while obtaining training, experience and preparation for licensure.

Lack of financial resources and living in remote locations are the two main barriers. Many potential candidates can’t stop working to enroll in one of the state’s teacher preparation programs because they have to earn a living; others live in rural areas and cannot attend college because of the required driving distance.

“This isn’t going to be the silver bullet that solves everything, but we hope that it becomes another really useful tool for filling positions,” said Thompson.

This new concept relies on local decisions. If a principal or other administrator identifies someone in their schools who displays a commitment and interest in serving students, that individual could be encouraged to use this pathway to certification.

Kathleen Shoup, an educator effectiveness program manager, said, “There is a sense of urgency to fill teacher positions due to the teacher shortage. And the teacher shortage areas for Idaho can be identified through the federal teacher shortage areas.”

According to a U.S. Department of Education report, last year Idaho had teacher shortages in the following instructional areas:

• Chinese and German
• English as a second language
• Science for gifted and talented
• Health science
• Music education
• Library/media specialist
• Special education for exceptional children
• Special education for visual impairment
• Special education for early childhood
• And director of special education

The salary for teacher apprentices is “at the discretion of the school district or charter school based on a locally set amount,” according to State Board documents. The program could take up to three years to complete but depending on an individual’s education level or experience, that timeframe could be shorter.

They will work under the supervision of a highly qualified mentor.  And “we hope to provide a stipend for those mentor teachers,” said Mike Keckler, chief communications officer.

Superintendents decide who the best apprenticeship candidates are

The superintendents of local education agencies (LEAs) or charter schools choose whether to participate and who will be offered contracts. Both state and federal funding will be made available to help with course materials, textbooks, professional development, required classes and other costs, Shoup explained.

“The key here is that it’s an employer-driven program,” Thompson said. “The LEA has to want to hire this person. It’s the LEA saying I have a candidate that I think is perfect.”

Apprenticeship candidates do not need a bachelor’s degree. Superintendents might consider someone looking to make a career change or a paraprofessional, but “it could be someone who works in any capacity in the school,” Thompson said. 

The selection criteria has not been decided, Shoup said. “That is part of the standards that we have to include for the US Department of Labor.” Eventually, Idaho’s program will apply to be a registered member of that federal agency. There are currently 21 states registered.

Successful teacher apprentices can obtain full certification

“I do want to emphasize that the competencies are important,” Thompson said.

Once they’re developed, those are the competencies — or teacher certification standards — that have to be evaluated by the superintendent, but “that is also why we want to make sure we have those additional assurances in place that they did pass the content assessment test.”

“That would help keep us all confident that the quality is high,” she said.

The Department of Labor requires 2,000 hours a year of on-the-job learning and 144 hours of related technical instruction. “And so if you multiply that by someone that potentially would have a three-year program, that’s 6000 hours of on the job learning” and then 432 hours of technical training, Shoup added.

“It’s a full-time job,” Keckler said.

Unlike the traditional route of obtaining a four-year degree and then completing supervised part-time teaching in your last semester, “this sort of flips the script on that, so you’re in the school and in the classroom full time, and on the side you’re getting the training you need to complete those competencies,” Thompson said.

“The hope is that at the end you’ve got the same training and experience — you’re just getting it in a flipped model,” she said.

“It’s a different pathway to certification, but they would ultimately receive a teacher certification,” Shoup said. “Non-traditional teaching programs lead to three-year interim certificates but the apprenticeship program will provide a standard five-year certificate.”

Idaho has four non-traditional certification options listed on the Board of Education website: American Board, College of Southern Idaho, Lewis-Clark State College and Teach for America.

The State Board of Education is sponsoring the program but will collaborate with other agencies — like the Idaho Department of Labor and U.S. Department of Labor — and higher education institutions. An advisory committee meeting was held in July and another one is planned for September. There are approximately 26 representatives serving on this committee.

Elizabeth Wargo, assistant professor of educational leadership at the University of Idaho, reassured attendees that it’s okay to be afraid or to be enthralled by new tech. Either way, though, schools are going to have to learn its classroom application or risk being left behind, said the seminar host.

“We want to think about AI as a thought partner. The common theme is collective efficacy, working together to support student and staff excellence,” she said.

Idaho Digital Learning Alliance superintendent Jeff Simmons concurred.

“It’s a tool that’s going to change how we teach and learn. Therefore, we have to use this as a tool. We have to teach our teachers how to use it and teach what it does and doesn’t do well,” Simmons said.

Though Chat GPT was rolled out on a mass scale in only the last six months, its AI text-producing application has already had an impact on schools. This was why audience members at “AI: Questions and Considerations” wrapped along three walls and spilled out into the Boise Centre hallway.

The purpose of the presentation is to not only acknowledge AI as a teaching tool, but to make sure that students and schools do not fall behind, American Falls superintendent Randy Jensen said.

“We can use this to create greater equity,” Jensen said. “And if we don’t help the have-nots, that gap is going to widen; we need to get over the debate of can we use it or can we not.”

This is especially true in rural schools, Wargo said, where digital connectivity is not as ubiquitous and districts tend to lag behind the funding of urban peers.

“Idaho is one of the richest places to have education happening in the world,” Wargo said. “I hate deficits.”

This equity can apply in myriad ways, Jensen points out. Text-generating tech can help guide students on their college essay, for example, closing the gap of kids from more wealthy backgrounds whose parents are able to pay for seminars, private tutors, tutoring services, and more.

Jensen points out different ways that he has used Chat GPT — to write objectives and apply these towards a two-day leadership agenda, for example.

Educational leadership professor Juhee Kim at the University of Idaho discussed how the academic institution empowers its professors.

“There is no university policy. Using AI is up to faculty,” Kim said.

What guides AI application is the U of I’s Academic Honesty statement and guidelines for faculty. This is a strategy Simmons favors for public school.

“What we’re really good at in education is banning things,” Simmons said. “What we have to embrace is that if it’s a thing now, it will always be a thing. Kids going through school now have access to AI and will always have access to AI. Whether we like the thing or not, it will always be a thing.”

“We’ll get an interim and move forward,” said commission chairman Alan Reed by phone Thursday.

However, Bluum CEO Terry Ryan expressed concern, because the commission is critical to ensuring the financial and academic quality and integrity of the vast majority of Idaho’s public charter schools. Bluum is a nonprofit that helps develop charter school growth throughout Idaho.

The IPCSC is the largest authorizer in the state with 62 charter schools; public school districts authorize 12 charter schools. The Legislature created the commission in 2004 to provide oversight. The commission’s seven board members are volunteers, appointed by the governor and the Legislature. 

“The state, the federal government and philanthropy have made multi-million dollar investments in Idaho public charter schools, while most importantly thousands of families have invested their children’s futures in these schools,” Ryan said.

“Quality has to be job one for all of us working in our public charter school space. This work is made harder when our public oversight agency is in disarray. The turnover of two executive directors in a matter of weeks is symptomatic of an organization that is troubled,” he said.

Commission director Nichole Hall submitted her resignation this week to accept a new job “that is appropriate for the current stage of my career.” She served as director for just under two months. The previous director, Jenn Thompson, resigned in early March.

Thompson and commissioner Brian Scigliano resigned in March because they felt several recent commission decisions were irresponsible. Thompson is now the chief planning and policy officer for the Office of the State Board of Education.

“I still feel (Hall) was the perfect one for the job. She had a vision of where we wanted to go as commissioners and she was doing a really good job working on that,” Reed said. 

Hall expressed mixed feelings about leaving but said, “When I initially applied for the position, I had applied for several other employment opportunities that were of interest to me and were suited for my professional background. Recently, I received an offer for” one of those positions.

The governor appointed Pete Koehler in June to fill Scigliano’s vacancy, leaving one more vacancy on the commission. His last appointment, Karen Echeverria, was rejected by the Senate in an uncommon move. In leading the campaign against Echeverria, Sen. Lori Den Hartog said she wants to see a commission that fills a dual role of advocacy and regulation.

Defining the charter commission’s role still an ongoing concern

“Commission chair Alan Reed is doing all he can as a volunteer to navigate the challenge of finding and retaining effective and stable leadership, while also ensuring that any leader hired in fact has the authority to lead,” Ryan said.

There is confusion within the commission and within the larger state education apparatus as to what their role is, Ryan added. “Is the commission a charter school support agency or is it an agency responsible for oversight and quality control? Or is it supposed to be both?”

Reed said the commission will do both: support schools and hold them accountable. “The goal is to get the commission so it understands that role of being supportive and making sure the schools are accountable for the performance certificate. (Hall) really had a clear vision of that, and we appreciate what she has started.”

However, the revolving door of directors undermines efforts for continuity and clarity.

“Without a clear direction, the commission staff will have a very hard time leading, as it is impossible to lead somewhere if you don’t know where you are going. This is a good time for the commission — and its supporters — to reboot and to clarify its role so that the next leader knows what he or she is expected to do and what the systems and processes are for getting the work done,” Ryan said.

The commission staff of four faces another period of uncertainty

Reed said commissioners are working on naming an interim director, as they prepare for this month’s regular meeting that takes place on Aug. 17. Hall’s last day on the job is scheduled for Aug. 8.

In addition to the director, the commission staff includes an office specialist, two portfolio managers and one finance manager. 

“I think they understand what they need to be doing. And we’re involved in the conversation about school funding right now. And Jacob (Smith) is on top of that; other than that, we’ve got a meeting to prepare for, which Nichole has pretty well ready to go for our meeting this month,” Reed said.

“We want to help them avoid problems and help them be … high performing schools and get a good return for the taxpayer money that we’re able to use.”

Disclosure: Idaho Education News and Bluum are funded by grants from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation. 

In response, the school system will continue a collaboration established this past school year with BPA Health, a behavioral health and managed services company.

“This partnership with BPA Health is another great tool to provide mental health support not just to the students but to their families as well, even through the summer months when help might be needed but school is out,” Shanks said.

From this summer and into next year, Boise school officials will continue to contract with BPA insurance to provide free counseling for families outside.

In the 2021-2022 school year, BPA Health began to offer five no cost counseling sessions for students and their immediate families/guardians. Funded by COVID-19 relief money and state grants, this service is available for tens of thousands students in Boise, West Ada, Kuna, Kimberley, Twin Falls, and the Heritage Community School.

These free counseling opportunities span the spectrum — behavioral health, legal consultation, parenting resources, financial planning, work-life balance skills, eldercare, and more.

“The school district can help a lot with the students who are willing to talk, but the issue is much bigger than that, which is why we have private services for students and BPA helping families,” Shanks said. “There’s a lot to be said about a systems approach that involves family and school.”

According to BPA CEO Sarah Woodley, they hope to address “anything in the family dynamic that’s making it difficult for students to achieve in school.” The company has a history in this realm based on a similar internal mission.

“We’ve offered employee assistance programs in Idaho for 40 years to help with life issues, issues that make it hard to be present at work,” Woodley said.

In answer to, “Where are families really struggling?” BPA put together a pilot program to extend mental health benefits that might help communities. Then the pandemic hit. This led to a “rough couple of years” that forced BPA to pivot to telehealth to provide contactless service.

Then, in Twin Falls in 2021, the managed services provider began to train school staff on how to approach families with necessary resources with voluntary access and no costs.

“We want families to know it’s a free service and totally confidential,” Woodley said. “No information goes back to the school. We’re just here for them to talk to someone about what’s happening.”

From just Jan. 1 to May 18 this year, over 200 students and family members tapped into these resources when BPA made them available in Boise.

Woodley said she’s heard “stories all the time about helping families at the end of their rope.” Though hundreds of families have used these five free sessions, the CEO would like to see many more utilize BPA’s service.

“We encourage folks to tackle these issues,” Woodley said.

In-school psychiatric services

While BPA offers assistance for families, Boise is providing free mental services for its students. This began with a grade 7-12 survey to determine need after coming through COVID.

“The district went down the path to see what students really say so we could start meeting the students where they needed us,” Boise supervisor of counseling services Jason Shanks said.

When the survey revealed that kids were struggling socially and emotionally, but schools were not equipped to respond with psychiatric care, Boise district staffers brought in outside help.

“Mental health services in schools are relatively new. We can’t rely just on schools. We rely on outside mental health providers partnering with individual schools,” Boise public information officer Dan Hollar said

Several Boise schools now receive mental health services from private practices. 24 different therapists from 11 different local agencies are connected to and operate within Boise institutions. This provides several advantages for students and the school.

Kids don’t need to drive or arrange a ride to therapy sessions or ask their parents to find help. Professionals are on site to help them. School counselors can serve as better resource liaisons for students and parents and act as a triage for crises. Teachers are freed from managing a classroom and mental health at once. Parents are assured their children are taken care of physically and emotionally in school.

The access to mental health care is unmatched in the current climate, according to Boise.

“Some students are seeing a six- to nine-month wait. With how difficult it is to get into mental services, counselors in our schools are seeing students fairly quickly,” Shanks said.

This progress is only the beginning for Shanks.

“I’m really excited for us to come back to school now that we’ve established that connectedness,” Shanks said. “I’m excited to see that focus on mental health this school year.”

“We can’t expect to have this monumental event and then go back to ‘normal.’ It doesn’t work like that. This is where the classroom has to change to become more adaptive,” said Garden Valley vice principal Michelle Ogle.

Tucked between the Payette River and mountain ranges, Garden Valley and its 500 residents and 286 students are isolated, which can exacerbate mental health issues.

“Mental health is high on the radar here in Garden Valley,” school district IT director Kevin Hennessey said. “Being a small, rural mountain town, there are lots of broken homes, substance abuse, juvenile arrests.”

Like hundreds of small U.S. timber towns, the loss of timber mills that began in the 1980s left many bereft and bored. When the pandemic magnified these issues, school officials knew that they had to get serious about helping students. Parents agreed.

A January 2023 survey of Garden Valley adult residents showed that 94.7% of participants believe that a program dedicated to providing mental health resources would benefit the student body and community. In response, Garden Valley instituted a number of potential solutions during the 2022-2023 school year.

First was a multi-tier system of support (MTSS) to better identify students in need. Led by Miranda Hennessey, MTSS broadened access to counseling services and helped identify academic and behavioral struggles.

“It’s 100 percent had an effect,” Hennessey said. “Miranda has a trusted bond with students and helped catch things that went under radar. We’ve definitely seen improvement.”

Next was a watchdog system installed on school computers. This flagged profanity and/or keyword searches for phrases like “suicide” and other warning signs. There is then an incident review and assessment then a second review to analyze if the search was assignment-related or of genuine concern.

Finally, Garden Valley brought mental health professionals to students via grant-funded telehealth software and School Pulse, an app-based counseling service. Not only did this meet students where they were (on their cell phones), services eliminated the challenge of face-to-face counseling access in a remote setting. Teachers were thankful for the lessened burden.

“Many teachers, while doing their best, struggle to deal with the complex issues their students present, leading to feelings of anxiety and hopelessness in our staff,” Hennessey stated in the grant application. Even when telehealth came on, logistics were still an issue for staff.

“We had kids on telehealth all over the place in the school building, wherever there was a space for it. Kids walking across the street to the district office…” Ogle said.

Castle Mountain Homes, a local architecture firm, stepped up with a solution. After donating summer construction, the resultant expanded student services center will include a designated room built with a lobby and private spaces for counseling sessions.

Ogle has been in charge of selecting soothing colors and welcoming furniture. When the school year begins, the mental health center will utilize booths every day on a schedule. Come September, there’s high hopes for an additional grant to provide even more robust telecommunications and connective capabilities.

Garden Valley is not alone in addressing student well-being.

The Boise School District is bringing private professionals into schools and offering whole family services in collaboration with a behavioral health and managed services company. And the State Department of Education is working with the Marsing, Glenn’s Ferry and Kimberly school districts to “embed sustainable mental and behavioral supports,” said the SDE’s Maggie Reynolds.

The Structure Literacy workshop is conducted by the Institute for Multi-Sensory Education.

The extra summer learning was prompted by the $1.5 million lawmakers appropriated to Idaho schools to deliver dyslexia training to teachers.

West Ada plans to add three literacy consultants and grant phonics workshop training for 40 teachers by the end of August.

IMSE trains teachers in targeted interventions and core reading strategies that focus on phonemic awareness and decoding words. Galileo Elementary first grade teacher Jolynn Aldinger is a believer.

Aldinger, entering her 19th year teaching in West Ada and her second year as an IMSE advocate, relates the story of a struggling student.

“I have a master’s degree in elementary reading and writing, and I couldn’t reach her. She’d take two steps forward and three steps back. And I just could not figure out what I was doing wrong. Why wasn’t she learning?” Aldinger said. “So I started looking into dyslexia, and other learning difficulties.”

What she eventually found was Structured Literacy methodology of breaking reading and spelling down into smaller skills like recognizing letters and sounds, and then building on these skills to form a solid foundation in phonemic-based literacy. With this method, even struggling readers can learn how to read, according to IMSE and Aldinger.

“I had such wild success in my classroom. It was magical watching these kids learn how to read,” Aldinger said. “You could just see them kind of sit up with this confidence. My gosh, I had first graders spelling ‘address’ and ‘bankrupt.’ And they understood why it was spelled that way.”

The National Institute of Health research indicates that one in five students show symptoms of dyslexia and 1-5% of kids show severe dyslexic symptoms.

“A core belief in West Ada is that literacy is a life skill. Literacy is not a ‘want to have.’ We don’t have this goal of what we would like to see happen with our students at the end of third grade. We want every one of our students to be literate at the end of third grade,” West Ada superintendent Derek Bub said during a dyslexia presentation at West Ada’s June 12 board meeting.

In 2022, 83% of West Ada’s third graders were reading at grade level compared to the state rate of 72%, according to the Idaho Reading Indicator exam. 

“We’re extremely proud of that. What that also tells us, though, is that 17% of our students need to get there,” Bub said.

West Ada officials decided to invest in IMSE training to help the 4,275 of their 16,000 K-3 students at risk for reading difficulties.

With a combination of $200,000 in district funding and $200,000 in state funding dedicated to professional development in West Ada, the school system dedicated $50,400 to train 40 current teachers as “resident experts”  to deliver IMSE Structured Learning curriculum across its 58 schools.

This investment also came via a little nudging from Decoding Dyslexia Idaho founder Robin Zikmund, one of a group of “angry parents” that presented their case to the West Ada board in January.

“We showed up with our red T-shirts and told Dr. Bub that you need to form a task force, and I want to be on it,” Zikmund said.

Zikmund became active in the red-shirted Decoding Dyslexia organization as mother to a now ninth-grade dyslexic child.

“We can’t just pour money into the problem with no requirements of where those funds are going. There’s got to be leadership with accountability,” Zikmund told EdNews.

Like other resort towns across the country — including Idaho’s own Sun Valley and Coeur d’Alene — McCall is plagued with high housing costs and a lack of housing availability. Just a quarter of available housing in McCall is lived in by locals — the vast majority of homes are vacation rentals or seasonal cabins, according to a 2022 housing action plan created by the city.

And that struggle is coupled with a lack of affordable childcare — an issue that impacts most of rural and remote Idaho. Some McCall workers are quitting their jobs or using paid vacation time and sick days to stay home and care for their own and other’s kids.

For the McCall-Donnelly School District, housing and childcare needs have burgeoned into significant barriers to recruiting and retaining a quality workforce, said district superintendent Eric Pingrey. Applicants have declined job offers because they can’t find housing and current teachers are concerned about returning to the classroom without a secure and affordable childcare option.

Last year, the Blaine County School District, located in popular Idaho resort town Sun Valley, implemented its own employee housing plan after facing similar retention and recruitment struggles caused by inflated housing costs.

So, the district is taking solutions into its own hands — by building new affordable housing units for staff and opening a fully operational daycare center in the district office.

Pingrey says the plan is part of the district’s role as the “heart of the community.”

“We have to take care of not only our staff, but the town as a whole,” Pingrey said. “Crisis is crisis.”

Early childcare center to open in August

The lack of childcare in McCall is so severe, a group of teachers and staff banded together to create a solution: rotating their own vacation and sick leave days to stay home with a group of kids. They sacrificed their own benefits because they had nowhere else to turn.

But the childcare issue extends far beyond the school district.

Staff from hospitals and other local organizations showed up in droves to community meetings to voice their own childcare struggles. And at least 60 people responded to a district survey with desperate childcare needs, including 13 school staffers and seven St. Luke’s staffers. By May, the district had 80 people interested in a childcare plan.

“It was heartbreaking listening to a lot of these young moms’ stories,” said Pingrey, following one district meeting. “We needed a solution.”

So, he worked with community members to develop one. Through donations and workforce readiness grants, the district raised $500,000 to start a daycare and preschool that will begin operating in August from inside the newly purchased 10,000-square-foot district office.

To start, the center will accept around 12 infants, 16 toddlers and 25 three- to five-year-olds, depending on staffing. The district will charge the going rate for care, around $200-$250/week. And there’s already a waitlist — right now, 80 kids are registered.

McCall-Donnelly is hiring paraprofessionals for the daycare. Wages start at $17.32 with benefits. Learn more at the district’s website.

Beyond filling a childcare need, the daycare will also be a resource for McCall-Donnelly’s students — those in the early childhood education CTE program can gain experience and earn credit by putting in hours at the facility.

Phase one of housing plan to be completed by next fall

This summer, the school district broke ground on its first housing complex — an eight-unit building with one- and two-bedroom apartments. The building is the first in a 35-unit housing plan, which will also include some three-bedroom, cottage-style homes.

The housing will go to current and prospective school district employees who can’t find stable housing, said Pingrey. The first building will be complete before the 2024-25 school year to help with next year’s recruitment efforts.

“Everything is moving smoothly,” the superintendent confirmed.

The district’s initiative aligns with a 2022 City of McCall plan to provide housing for locals earning up to 100% of the area median income (about $60,000). The plan is to produce housing at an “aggressive, but achievable” rate (an average of 50 units per year), and to increase the local occupancy rate from 27% to 40%.

Building housing is more sustainable for the district compared to other recruiting and retention solutions, like boosting staff salaries, according to Pingrey. Offering housing fills a need and also brings in extra cash.

So far, McCall-Donnelly’s housing plan comes at no extra cost to taxpayers. The district pulled reserve funds and auctioned land to raise $5 million for phase one, avoiding a bond or supplemental levy proposal.

The district hasn’t yet created an application and acceptance process for the housing, but qualified applicants will need to demonstrate need — something Pingrey says isn’t hard for many employees to do.

“I can’t even afford a house here,” he said. “I’ve got one more year on my lease and I’m not sure what I’ll do after that.”

Commemorating the lottery’s 34th anniversary, administrators handed over an $82 million dividend, a 12.3% increase from last year and the largest single dividend payment in Idaho’s history.

“The Idaho Lottery makes a difference in every community in Idaho: for our citizens, for our small businesses, and most importantly, where it matters most, in our classrooms,” Little said.

Lottery dividends make up a small piece of the school funding puzzle; this year, Little and legislators agreed to put close to $2.7 billion of state tax money into K-12.

School districts use lottery dividends for building maintenance, repairs, and operational projects. The Wright Brothers Building Co., for example, is wrapping up asbestos abatement and restroom reconstruction on both floors of the 1957-era Emmett Middle School — the former Emmett High School, which is Little’s alma mater.

“They were down to the studs,” Emmett Middle principal Debbie Dawson said. “It was quite a sight to see.”

Little wasn’t the only public figure to accept a check on Tuesday afternoon. Idaho Lottery Commission Chairman Craig Corbett presented state superintendent Debbie Critchfield with $51.25 million — representing the bulk of the overall $82 million dividend.

The $51.25 million goes into two pots of money: $30.75 million for school maintenance and operations projects, and $20.5 million for the SDE’s Bond Levy Equalization Fund, which helps offset the cost of new schools.

“As Idaho’s schools age and costs of maintenance continue to grow, Idaho Lottery funds play a crucial role in ensuring facility safety for our students, staff and patrons,” Critchfield said to attendees.

This includes “Do Good” initiatives, one of Little’s first acts when he took office in 2019. These lottery-funded programs fulfill teaching supplies with “Classroom Wishlists,” library books with “Bucks for Books,” additional resources with “Scratch for Schools.”

“I have seen firsthand the difference the Idaho lottery is making in schools,” Corbett said. “Idaho is a vast, diverse state with many themes. One common theme is providing a quality education. I’m very proud of the contributions the lottery makes each year to benefit and improve and enhance the quality of education for Idaho students.”

In addition to the $51.25 million going to public schools, a $30.75 million dividend will go to the Permanent Building Fund, which bankrolls state facilities and higher education capital projects.

This year’s dividends was sourced by the Idaho Lottery’s largest single sales year, pulling in $422 million in revenue. Of this cash flow, the lottery paid back a record $285.9 million out in prizes and brick and mortar lottery retailers earned a record $24.7 million.

The teacher shortage issue plaguing some school districts is not a problem in Kuna.

As Kuna School Board trustees prepare for the upcoming school year, superintendent Wendy Johnson presented results from an annual staff survey, highlighting the district’s low number of vacant teaching positions.

She attributed that success to two factors: “One is who they work for and one is who they work with.”

This year, about 80% of Johnson’s staff — 553 people — participated in the survey, which is a good rate, she said.

“When you ask, you gotta be ready for the answer. And when we looked at this within our district, we were pleasantly surprised by what we saw,” Johnson said.

To see the full survey results, use this link.

The survey measures employee satisfaction with their work environment, training and leadership feedback. They will be used by the district’s strategic planning team to identify areas for improvement. Some results are listed below, from lowest to highest by the percentage of staff who agree with the statement.

• In the last six months, someone at work has talked to me about my progress — 65%
• In the past month, I have received recognition or praise for doing good work — 70%
• I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right — 74%
• At work, my opinions are taken into account — 80%
• I would recommend Kuna School District as a place to work — 82%
• This last year, I have had opportunities at work to learn and grow — 85%
• There is someone at work who encourages my development — 85%
• My associates and fellow employees are supporting each other — 86%
• At work, I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day — 88%
• The mission or purpose of my workplace makes me feel my job is important — 89%
• Someone at work, seems to care about me as a person — 95%
• I know what is expected of me at work — 96%

“That’s pretty darn good,” Johnson said.

“We probably need to improve those top two areas, making sure that we talk about progress with our employees and making sure that they have goals and that we’re giving feedback. And then continuing our efforts to recognize people who are doing good — giving credit to our employees,” she said.

Johnson prefaced her teacher vacancy presentation with Lewis-Clark State College research. Teacher education chair Mark Haynal identified five reasons why teachers are leaving the profession.

• Poor pay, especially considering the level of education.
• Too much emphasis on standardized tests.
• Lack of respect from society and students.
• Lack of public support, especially when it comes to funding.
• Parents who shield their kids from the natural consequences of their choices and blame the teacher or principal.

Despite those concerns, Kuna is trending in a positive direction. Year over year, the district has reduced the number of vacant teaching positions by 52%. There are currently eight unfilled positions: one elementary, six secondary and one nurse. A year ago, there were 17: four elementary and 13 secondary.

“You can’t fire your way to success. You have to build the skills of people,” Johnson said.

Proposed parental rights policy stalls

On first reading, Policy 639 — a proposed district policy outlining parental rights in education — was sent back to the policy advisory committee for further discussion.

“I think there’s some things that we can improve based on what we heard tonight,” one trustee said.

Melissa Sommercorn asked the board to strengthen parental rights in the new policy.

“I had an issue with one of my children who was not able to understand the assignments. He was coming home confused and everything that I was asking the teachers was conflicting with what he was saying,” she said.

“We just needed to get to the bottom of what is going on in the classroom. Everything we had tried at home — rewards, consequences, following up — nothing was working. And so I proposed to the teachers that I just come in and observe and see what is going on.

“And they did not want that. And as a result, my son continued to flounder. And he treaded water academically for a year,” Sommercorn explained.

“Can you consider an appeals process? I feel like I could have helped the teacher. I wanted to help my son. I want to help the teachers and it was denied, because they could,” she said.

Proposed bathroom use policy moves forward

Trustees sent a policy on student bathroom use forward to second reading. The proposed policy requires students to use the bathroom or changing facility that corresponds with their gender assigned at birth.

If passed, the policy would align the Kuna district with an Idaho law passed by the 2023 Legislature.

A short discussion focused on making the policy’s title clearer. 

According to the policy language, the definition of changing facility means a facility in which a person may be in a state of undress in the presence of others, including in the locker room changing during showering or restroom. 

To more accurately reflect that, trustees suggested including “locker rooms, changing rooms, shower rooms and restrooms” in the title to more accurately reflect what the policy is referring to.  There was no public comment about the policy.

Subdivision developer donates 10 acres

The developers of Seasons Creek Village Subdivision donated 10 acres to the district as a possible site for a new elementary school.

The district is not planning to build one at the moment, but it remains a possibility, as does selling the land and using the funds to benefit the district.

The minimum acreage for building a new school is 10 acres, Johnson said.

This motion proposes that all Idaho high school students either remain in school or be homeschooled until the age of 18. (This does not apply to students that graduate early or earn their GED.)

Caldwell trustees, for a second time, will seek representation for this resolution to raise the required school age to 18 at the 2024 legislative session.  At present, Idaho Code 33-202 requires that students between the ages of 7 and 16 attend school. The school board brought this forth to make sure that “our youth to be better prepared for their future,” according to an email from district communications.

In addition, trustees hope to resolve the conflict created by penalizing schools when student dropouts don’t graduate.

“Ultimately, our future is brighter when our youth graduate with their diploma,” Caldwell communications officials told EdNews.

Caldwell trustees first proposed ISBA Resolution No. 3 in 2022 when it received overwhelming support from other Idaho school boards.

“We need our students in school, or parents are to be expected to homeschool their children if they are going to allow them to drop out at 16 or 17,” superintendent Shalene French said during the board meeting. “Otherwise, they become a student that we receive back and it becomes quite a challenge for them to move forward.”

Trustees reiterated their support for ISBA Resolution No. 3 on Monday.

“I think it’s an important conversation to have,” trustee Travis Manning said. “There is a disparity there between some of the state requirements and there’s ambiguity. Unfortunately, the school is still held accountable for the graduation rates (the non-graduation rate) and they (the students) are missing out on a lot of opportunities, as outlined in this particular resolution.”

ISBA Resolution No. 3 asserts that age 16 is the beginning of a bridge towards college, technical training and/or a career. Its main points include:

• Students sit for a required college entrance exam typically in 11th grade, when most students are older than 16.
• Idaho high schools are accountable for 90 percent graduation rates, but this includes two years when most public school students are older than 16.
• Idaho’s high schools are also accountable for college and career readiness as measured by student participation in: Advanced Placement, Dual Credit, international baccalaureate, and career technical courses. Students complete most of these during senior year when they are 17 years or older.
• College and career readiness also requires student acquisition of industry-recognized professional or technical certifications, usually completed in 12th grade when most students are 17 years or older.

“For me, it’s like putting guardrails up for the students who might go, ‘Well, I’m 16 so I can or could, or should, or would…’ and it’s like, ‘No, stick it out. Stick it out until 18,” trustee Patricia Robinson said Monday.

These “guardrails” would be there to protect students from themselves and from parents, Pesina said in a personal anecdote.

“Back in the day, 40 years ago, my dad assumed I had to be in school until I graduated,” Pesina said. “Had he known that he could pull me out at 16, he would’ve, so that I could go work in the fields. I’m glad he didn’t know better. That’s the guardrail. It’s important because there are kids out there who do want to achieve and to keep going, that they are able to.”

After readoption, the Caldwell board has until July 31 to notify ISBA deputy director and government affairs affiliate Quinn Perry to bring the resolution to the ISBA board. Then ISBA members will vote on whether to support it or not at the ISBA convention in November.

Following a 20-minute executive session, the City Council resolved the request quickly by passing a motion to approve the school’s appeal. Parents, students, grandparents and supporters showed their support for the four-year-old charter school by filling the council’s chambers.

“We had lots and lots of support present. It was standing room only,” said Stephen Lambert, executive director of American Classical Schools of Idaho and founding principal of TVCA.

“It’s very gratifying,” he said about the turnout Monday night.

Without the council’s favorable decision, the school’s $7.5 million planned construction of a new middle and high school in downtown was essentially stopped. In June, the planning and zoning commission abruptly denied a conditional use permit, citing in its denial traffic issues, project costs and impact to the area.

Tuesday morning, building and zoning clerk Beth Earles had not received any notice from the city council or TVCA. Once it’s received in that office, it will be placed on the “earliest agenda where we are able to meet the state’s publishing requirements,” she said.

The Planning and Zoning Commission is next scheduled to meet in City Hall on Aug. 8 at 7 p.m. Lambert is hopeful the permit request would be on the August agenda.

“I think it’ll give us a fair hearing, so I appreciate that,” said Lambert.

The new hearing will “give us an opportunity to bring mitigation and improvements to the table that we just didn’t have time to talk about, because we didn’t have time to respond” at the June 13 commission meeting, he said.

“We believe that we’re going to bring forward some positive improvements that will address and mitigate the concerns,” Lambert added.

But that will come at a cost.

To mitigate the traffic and infrastructure concerns raised by zoning commissioners, Lambert estimates the project will cost an additional $1 million to $1.5 million. Rather than $7.5 million, the TVCA upper campus could top $9 million.

The campus is planned for 8.62 acres at the corner of North Arizona Avenue and Northwest 13th Street, southeast of St. Luke’s Clinic. The upper campus would include three new academic buildings, a gym and cafeteria, a bus parking cul-de-sac, a 150-vehicle parking lot and a soccer field. The new campus would serve seventh- through 12th-graders.

“If tonight is any indication, (parents) are strongly supportive of us being successful in the appeals process and ultimately getting the campus built that we need,” Lambert said after the meeting.

Trustees recognized now-graduated West Ada seniors and the community that supported them, heard presentations from new administrators, approved new/revised policy recommendations and discussed West Ada’s strategic vision for 2023-27.

These policies and strategic vision will direct how Idaho’s largest school system plans to steer its students towards college and career readiness.

Digging into the details

After the Pledge of Allegiance, an almost three-minute video provided highlights from 2023 West Ada graduation ceremonies — commencement speeches, student reflections, addresses from teachers and Superintendent Derek Bub.

Following the video and Bub’s acknowledgement to the trustees of all the hard work staff and trustees put in, three new West Ada leaders were introduced.

Jeff Christopherson will step in as principal of Hunter Elementary School, Courtney Parker as principal of Meridian Elementary and Meg McGroarty of Renaissance High. These new school leaders all arrive with experience as educators and education directors along with recommendations from teachers and staff.

Christopherson began his career as a teacher at Desert Sage Elementary School before serving as a principal intern at Star and Willow elementary schools. He takes over for the now retired principal, Julie Prince.

Parker is also a former teacher in the district and served as a principal intern at Meridian Elementary.

McGroarty comes from Riverside, Calif., and gained experience as a middle and high school principal, and an educational consultant in northwest Washington. McGroarty began the interview process just two weeks ago and arrived in West Ada at 9:30 p.m. the night before the board meeting.

Typically, after recognitions and introductions, the board assigns at least 30 minutes for patron testimony. This July, there was no public in attendance to testify.

Next, the district dug into the numbers and issues, including a June expense report. The report outlined expenses for bus maintenance, waste disposal and transportation reimbursements, along with purchases for flutes, clarinets, a tenor sax, dumbbells, synthetic blood and male and female skeletons.

Policy review included student enrollment and textbook hearing process updates to align with new state-level legislation, discipline procedure clarification, student dress code (that now prohibits hats for elementary school students), staff dress code (expected to exceed the formality of student dress), simplified immunization requirements and communicable disease policies, emergency administration of medication, student health and safety (that aligns to new parental rights legislation), and administrative regulation of middle and high school graduation requirements (that’s intended to improve parent communication).

All of these new policy recommendations were approved by the West Ada board.

Next, chief operations officer Jonathan Gillen and Meridian Technical Charter High School principal Randy Yardon presented their initial intentions for updating the high school’s charter, written 25 years ago.

Meridian Tech is an alternative career and technical charter high school, funded by state money that flows through West Ada. The district owns the building and provides the school’s transportation, custodial, payroll and other expenses while allowing the charter to oversee curriculum and finances.

Before approving a new charter, board members requested assurance that Meridian Tech school does not compete with other West Ada high schools, expands offerings, and delivers a distinct and impactful curriculum.

Superintendent Bub asserted that Meridian Tech is an indispensable yet independent arm that works closely with West Ada. Trustee David Binetti (via phone) reiterated this collaboration, citing Meridian Tech students that kept the Python programming club at Eagle Middle School going by stepping up as volunteer tutors and mentors.

Meridian Tech will make a formal presentation of its updated charter in August.

A 10-minute break led trustees to the Grand Teton room for a 40-minute work session to hammer out West Ada Strategic Plan details. Discussions over the seven-page plan have unfolded over the past year. The document provides the framework that scaffolds West Ada’s mission: student preparation for college and career readiness.

While this mission has not changed, the vision statement reflects a collective drive towards college and career-ready students through a focus on “teaching, learning and innovation, student success, safety & wellness, and family & community collaboration.”

Board members will present this new strategic plan to the public in August.

The new dress code comes after district data revealed discrepancies in dress code enforcement that disproportionately targeted female students and students of color. The district embarked on a months-long process of digging into the code, and collecting community and student feedback.

Trustees focused on cutting down arbitrary language in the new policy to prevent inconsistency from school to school, and give school staff clear guidelines. They hope the new policy will improve student-staff relationships, limit the code’s impact on teaching time and give parents more control over their child’s dress and education.

The proposal also emphasizes enforcement training for administrators and school staff.

One district patron showed for public comment on the code.

Becky Terhaar, a mother of two Boise students, said she’s seen the impacts of the previous dress code first hand.

Her daughter, now a high schooler, has been frequently cited for violating the dress code throughout her time at North Junior High School and now Boise High School. She began testing the dress code to see if her friends would get cited while wearing her clothes, and they weren’t.

“The dress code was less about the attire and more about how some adults in the classroom or in the school setting were uncomfortable being around students with breasts,” Terhaar told the board.

The new code, she said, is a vast improvement on the previous code — with some caveats.

“It goes a long way toward reducing the sort of uneven enforcement that often targeted people based on their body type or just their manner of dressing in ways that maybe weren’t actually inappropriate but stood out from their peers,” she said.

But Terhaar added that prohibiting “visible underwear” could unintentionally lead to added violations for students who wear bras as undershirts or for extra coverage.

The board acknowledged Terhaar’s comment before unanimously approving the policy, and said changes could be made to the new code down the line.

Trustee applications to open Wednesday

The Boise School Board is on the lookout for a new trustee.

The board officially declared a vacancy Monday night, left by former trustee Andy Hawes, who announced his departure at a May meeting.

Trustee applications will go live on Wednesday, according to board president Dave Wagers, and district staff. Any district patron who wants to apply to be a trustee must return their application by Aug. 11. The board will then host a workshop on Aug. 18 to narrow down applications, and will later conduct candidate interviews.

The goal, said Wagers, is to have a new trustee in place by Sept. 11.

Board approves three ISBA resolutions

Trustees approved three resolutions — or legislative directives — to take to the Idaho School Boards Association later this year for full approval. ISBA resolutions, if approved, become the education organization’s legislative priorities for the year.

The resolutions consider paraprofessional requirements, school funding, and open enrollment.

Requirements for paraprofessional employment in Idaho 

This resolution calls for an amendment to Idaho Code that would eliminate roadblocks for prospective paraprofessionals, said trustee Nancy Gregory.

As of December 2022, local districts can no longer administer the PRAXIS — an aptitude test for prospective parapros. Instead, they must go to a testing site and pay an $80 test fee.

“The testing system is already backlogged nearly one month for scheduling the test, and should the prospective employee fail the test by even a single point, they would need to wait at least another month to retest,” reads the resolution.

The resolution calls on the Legislature to allow local districts to administer State Board-approved assessments for paraprofessional certification in lieu of the PRAXIS.

“This is not just a Boise School District issue, this is a statewide issue,” said Gregory.

Open enrollment program and building capacity limits

This resolution comes as a reaction to a law passed in the most recent legislative session, which requires schools to accept students from outside district boundaries — a program known across Idaho as open enrollment.

The directive calls on the Legislature to allow districts to make exceptions in open enrollment when school buildings are at or over capacity, or when a school’s special programs (like career technical education and special education) are full.

It would also allow a district to transfer a student to another school without parental consent, when their current school has reached or exceeded capacity.

K-12 funding formula principles

The district’s final resolution calls on the Legislature to rewrite Idaho’s school funding formula — a complex system that dictates how schools get money and how much money they receive.

The new formula should adhere to principles and requirements laid out in the resolution:

• Predictability
• Adequacy
• Transparency
• Stability
• Uniformity and thoroughness
• Supportive of quality staffing
• Holds harmless (does not decrease the per-pupil dollars a district currently receives)
• Reinstates enrollment based funding
• Accountability

All three resolutions will be heard and voted on by the Idaho School Boards Association membership this fall.

A supporter of the model, the National Education Association describes apprenticeships as “earn as you learn” programs where aspiring educators are paid a living wage while they take courses and spend one or two academic years working alongside an experienced teacher in a school.

The apprenticeship model — typically used to train electricians and plumbers — allows candidates to earn a degree and teaching certification while employed by a school district.

Still in the planning phase, Idaho’s teacher apprenticeship program will require its candidates — those who have not yet earned a bachelor’s degree — to meet the same standards as a traditional program. Because the program has not been fully developed, there are limited details about timelines, coursework, costs, participating districts and who qualifies to enter the program.

But what is available at this time can be found at this link. 

In other states, similar programs serve recent high school graduates, paraprofessionals and other community members looking to make a career change, according to Education Week, a Maryland nonprofit organization covering K-12 topics. 

Because the U.S. Departments of Labor and Education have urged states and school districts to create and register apprenticeship programs for teaching, more states are looking at this model to combat teacher shortages. Tennessee was the first state to be approved by the Department of Labor and seven other states have a registered apprenticeship program for teachers — Arkansas, Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, New Hampshire, Texas and West Virginia, according to Education Week.

Idaho joins several other states in the process of pursuing or developing teacher apprenticeship programs, Education Week wrote in a recent article.

Idaho’s new law says teacher apprentices who complete a practicum, internship or student teaching position under the supervision of a certificated staff person will be paid, and those who successfully complete the program will be eligible for standard certification. 

The State Board of Education is coordinating the new program. It has created a committee of about 20 stakeholders from various educational entities who will meet for the first time July 20 to start developing the program. 

“We expect to have a scope of work and some timelines coming out of that July meeting,” said Jenn Thompson, chief policy and government affairs officer. 

“There will be opportunities for public comment as we progress,” she added.

Leading up to the July meeting, the SBOE is gathering input from the legislative sponsors, superintendents and the Idaho Department of Labor, where the program will be registered.

“There is work to be done around designing what a path to teaching looks like within the boundaries of that program.  Specifically, whether we will create multiple pathways, defining the expected on-the-job competencies and related technical instruction,” Thompson said.

Senate Bill 1069 made administrative changes in the current certification requirements to allow individuals who complete an approved registered teacher apprenticeship program to be eligible for certification. Individuals participating in an approved teacher apprenticeship program will be paid at the discretion of the school district or charter school based on a locally set amount for participants of the apprenticeship program. 

Without the city’s support for expansion, the school’s commitment to offer a full high school could be in jeopardy and possibly disrupt about 300 students. The school was authorized to operate as a K-12 school and serve 702 students by 2025.

The school needs more classroom space to continue its planned expansion. It currently serves up to 10th grade at its one main campus.

In June, the city’s planning and zoning commission denied the school’s request for a conditional use permit to build a new middle and high school, called the TVCA Upper Campus. 

The estimated $7.5 million campus is planned for 8.62 acres at the corner of North Arizona Avenue and Northwest 13th Street, southeast of St. Luke’s Clinic. The permit will allow a school campus in an area already zoned commercial.

The Upper Campus would serve grades 7-12 and include three new academic buildings, a gym and cafeteria, a bus parking cul-de-sac, a 150-vehicle parking lot and a soccer field.

In its denial, the planning commission cited traffic issues, written and public testimony received, project costs and impact to the area. Since that planning and zoning meeting, attorneys for the school and city have discussed possible solutions and remediation measures.

The Monday, July 10, meeting starts at 7 p.m. at city hall in Fruitland.

Commission director Nichole Hall said, “Our staff has begun the discussion on how we are already supporting our charter schools, how to increase awareness and make this support more accessible, and how to expand on current offerings. We will be developing a plan related to content, delivery and timeline.”

The IPCSC is the largest authorizer in the state with 62 charter schools. The Legislature created the commission in 2004 to provide oversight of the schools it authorizes. The commission’s seven board members are volunteers, appointed by the governor and the Legislature.

“We received almost three times as many results in the survey this year,” said Melissa-Jo Rivera, one of the commission’s portfolio managers.

This year’s stakeholder survey received 88 responses from administrators, school board members and parents.  Those leaders suggested additional training opportunities to better understand the performance framework, provide leadership boot camps for administrators and board members, and more collaborative time with other charter schools.

“Networking with charter opportunities, this has really been a hot topic since I got here,” Rivera told commissioners during a recent meeting. “Charter schools just don’t feel that there is enough conferences and support for just charter schools.”

After reviewing the feedback, Hall added, “It was determined that there is a need for clear, concise training and guidance related to commission policy and performance measures related to IPCSC’s performance framework. It was also apparent that charter schools would like additional support through the initial formative years.”

On a four-point scale, the commission scored highest on autonomy and accountability: it protects each school’s autonomy to make decisions at the school board level; and it holds each school accountable to the terms and metrics of their performance certificate. These survey comments support the commission’s approach:

“We have always been a staunch supporter of the IPCSC. Holding schools to a standard of accountability is the only way to have successful schools,” one survey comment read.

“A positive working relationship between the charter school and the IPCSC staff is a critical piece for overall success to be had. The departure of Tamara Baysinger has dampened our relationship with the staff a bit. We hope to see that improve,” another commenter wrote.

“Love your support and diligence. Please keep filtering out the nonsense so that administration and teachers can influence students to optimal learning,” according to a statement in the survey.

While accountability is viewed as a strength, others pointed out deficiencies in that area: The commission should provide measurements that are based on evidence of more than one to two years or that don’t vary based on the school’s structure, according to a statement in the survey.

“I have reviewed many of the charter renewals for the current year and am shocked at some of the conditions for renewal that were imposed on the schools. As an MBA who has worked in schools, I can honestly state there is no basis for a lot of the conditions, and unfortunately for the schools, they don’t feel they have an option to say no that they don’t work,” according to that statement.

Meanwhile, stakeholders rated them lowest on issues related to communication. Some participants feel that there is not sufficient opportunity to provide feedback on matters of agency planning and the level of communication received from the commission is lacking.

Hall responded, “With the commission’s responsibilities revolving around accountability measures and the associated verification process, we will be looking to streamline processes, data collection, and support efforts, in order to allow our program managers the time needed to work more closely with individual charter schools.”

The following disapproving comments were compiled from the survey:

• It is very difficult to contact IPCSC staff directly, by phone. It is a surprise when they answer the phone.
• Open communication with IPSCS members without the extraordinary efforts by ISPCS staff to stifle communication with publicly appointed commission members.
• Increased collaboration with charter schools outside of the renewal process.
• More communication with the legislature so they understand the importance of charter schools.
• I would like to see less politically driven scrutiny from staff and ask that they apply simple or straightforward criteria while evaluating a charter school application. There is little deference given to qualified board members, often with more experience in education than the entire staff. The application  process appeared to be constantly moving the goalposts.
• Reasonable oversight rather than looking for reasons to criticize schools and mark them lower on performance reports.
• Providing these “resources” that they speak of. Being more approachable and supportive instead of feeling more like rebuking and an unhappy boss. 
• Review how staff recommendations are created and ensure spot checks are performed to ensure proper and fair processes are being applied across the board. It appeared during our effort to bring a fresh, new virtual charter to Idaho that there were an amazing amount of roadblocks thrown up to stop the effort, none of which I had seen in the past.
• I’m not aware of them providing resources, just reprimands. We are also often frustrated by the achievement metrics they create for our schools when we can’t even replicate those or figure out how they got them. That’s certainly not “transparent” or clear.

The commission staff gathers the feedback annually and presents it to the charter commission during a regular meeting. This year’s survey occurred between February and March, and the staff’s presentation took place in April.

“We heard loud and clear that schools want more networking opportunities. We need to build that into the budget,” commented vice-chairman Sherrilynn Bair during the presentation.

Ada County Juvenile Services educators and staff want to keep kids invested in school. 

The county agency applies strategies to address a multitude of issues to get kids back onto a more constructive path in life and in school. This means identifying gaps in family and communal support and delivering necessary mental health counseling, incentive-based education programs, career and personal finance instruction and a positive environment for underserved youth.

“I’ve worked in places and seen how people get caught up in the system,” Jessica Barawed, Ada County’s juvenile detention division manager said. “If you can be proactive and keep people connected to the community instead of to the system, let’s do it. Let’s not feed into the adult corrections facilities.”

Barawed spent her career working in correctional facilities, from “really terrible ones to the most amazing.” This includes 15 years with the San Diego Sheriff’s Department and time spent working to rehabilitate San Quentin prison inmates. Now, she oversees classrooms of 10- to 16-year old Ada County inmates who work towards credit recovery to get back on a high school graduation track.

There are 12 kids in Ada County detention today. This number hovered around 40 during COVID, Barawed said, but officials want to keep this number as low as possible. The aim is to only detain for “criminogenic needs” — offenders that might be a societal threat. Even with that, the intention is to provide an environment where these teens might be able to turn things around.

“We’re trying to make the environment better. It’s just so important,” Barawed said. “So many people walk in here and are like, ‘Oh, this is like a classroom. And this is like a school. And it’s clean.’ We are so fortunate with the resources we have.”

Barawed, along with two full-time teachers, a special education specialist and a Boise schools principal develops holistic diagnoses to determine why incarcerated juveniles have struggled to attend and to succeed in class. Factors like mental health strains from a lack of basic emotional and economic needs being met contribute to antisocial behavior that’s led to detainment.

“We know that youth have already received their consequence coming to detention. We don’t need to keep piling on,” Barawed said. “Let’s try and motivate them to get them where they need to be to be successful.”

Staff focus on applying creative treatment and incentives, “little things that go a long way,” such as healthy snack incentives as an instant reward for attending class. There is also consideration for mental health breaks and outdoor time.

The Ada County juvenile education facility is built like a school instead of a prison. Class and reading rooms are painted in bright, natural colors with walls festooned with positive messages, student work and class accomplishments. Bookshelves line the walls of every class in addition to the reading and multimedia rooms. Desktop computer stations sit alongside desks.

“I am of the belief that we can create magic in here,” Barawed said.

The importance of this environment is the reason why director Alison Tate secured American Rescue Plan Act funds to construct a $1.6 million outdoor facility “in place of a cage.” A metal, barrel-shaped roof will enclose an area with room for court sports alongside an artificial turf lawn for play. There will be shaded space for clinicians to meet with kids that need to “blow off some steam,” according to Tate.

“Staff will feel safe taking the youth out there, so we’re excited about that,” Tate said.

This is all work towards incorporating a recidivism-reducing setting where rehabilitative programming is emphasized. For low-risk offenders, Ada County has an additional program to get back students on track: Education Career Opportunity.

Education Career Opportunity

Founded in 2016, ECO is a state-funded program designed to meet the individual needs of court-involved youth — at-risk and probationary. ECO is specifically for youth on probation and is provided by Ada County as a service to the court. Overseen by programs division manager Jeff Schatz, not only are ECO kids on probation for criminal violations, they are vulnerable to not completing their high school education. Barriers not only include a juvenile offense and probation, but the costs of a preparing and taking all four GED section exams — books, computers, study materials, test costs and more. The ECO program eliminates those barriers as Ada County pays for those costs.

“We were in crisis. We knew that there was a gap for the kids that we serve where traditional school may not be an option,” Schatz said. “We went and explained this to the board of county commissioners. The solution was the ECO program. And they said, ‘Let’s do it.’ And within a week or so, we were up and running.”

The current ECO teacher, Kristi Swanson, has 25 years of experience helping to prevent truancy. Working in alignment with its community partner, the Idaho Connect Online School education provider, ECO students can choose credit retrieval in working towards a transition back to school and a diploma or they can pursue a GED.

“ICON is a great partner for us because they can provide subject matter expertise on say, a senior project or something like that,” Schatz said. “And if we do get to the point where our teacher is overwhelmed (with students), they will supply us with an additional teacher free of charge.”

The program’s arms include mental health, family and substance-abuse counseling. There is also academic and vocational assistance — study help, scheduling guidance, financial help for tests, career counseling and more.

ECO students not only pursue credit recovery and GED options, but can acquire employability skills like resume building, job search, interviewing skills and work maturity skills. For students pursuing jobs after education completion, they can also enroll in independent living skills like personal finance, household management and nutrition. A community resource specialist provides personalized direction and even transportation to interviews.

This personalized devotion for ECO students allows students to work at their own pace. Because youths enter the program at various levels of education and at various needs to earn GEDs, the numbers can be difficult to pin down, but the last two years does indicate a rise in the number and percentage of students who earn GED certificates. In 2022, 15 students out of 48 earned GEDs. In 2023, out of 44 GED students, 19 earned GEDs.

What is clear to administrators is that the people surrounding these kids working towards adulthood found support in working through ECO.

“The thing that kind of made me sit back is you have kids that are not involved in a traditional school and are going through this on their own, the family support that they had is pretty impressive,” Schatz said.

In order to augment that, Ada County Juvenile Services decided to hold a celebration for students that earned this accomplishment.

“We didn’t really know what we were doing or how we wanted it to go down, but it turned out really nice,” Schatz said.

This year, the second year of the celebration at Liberty Park, turned out families from about 10 graduates, including David Castillo-Rojas, a father supporting a son as a head chef at Applebee’s, has dreams of heading to college in the fall to major in business.

“I’m very happy and proud now, thinking about a bright future,” Castillo-Rojas said.

Smith’s classroom instruction earned her the Presidential Innovation Award for Environmental Educators and commendation as a member of the Grosvenor Teacher Fellowship Cohort.

“I am so proud to represent Idaho and the Northwest Region 10 with this award,” Smith said of the PIAEE award. “I’m excited to use the award money to further my professional development in the area of environmental education.”

Associated money awarded to her school will go towards “supporting environmental education projects and field trips.”

The 1990 National Environmental Education Act created the PIAEE award to celebrate and support classroom projects that elevate environmental science instruction that activate creative thinking through materials outside of textbook learning.

The Grosvenor Teacher Fellowship, administered through a National Geographic and Lindblad Expeditions partnership, recognizes educators committed to authentic geographic education. As part of the honor, 2023 Fellows will embark on global expeditions to exotic places like the Galápagos Islands and Australia’s Wild Northwest Kimberley region.

Smith chose Patagonia in order to animate the sixth grade social studies curriculum and connect students with the region’s geography, culture, climate and ecosystems.

The educator will voyage around the southern tip of South America where she will be mentored by National Geographic photographers and Lindblad Expedition naturalists on board expedition vessels. Through this sabbatical, Smith also aims to develop professional communities across Idaho via the Idaho Environmental Education Association.

“Ultimately, I hope to help my students and others to understand the interconnectedness of humans and nature and to foster an explorer mindset.”

This title was the visible crest of a wave that had been building since summer 2017 when school officials began a collaborative effort to make sure that their students were attending school every day, especially at the primary school level.

From January 2023 to this May, Sacajawea Elementary School saw the number of chronically absent students drop by 13% (from 123 to 88 students). Out of their 390 total Sacajawea students, 302 attended more than 90% of school days in May.

While this is still much higher than school staff would like to see, this 22% chronic absentee rate is a significant improvement during the course of a semester. This rate is also lower than Caldwell’s 2021-2022 39% district chronic absentee rate reported last October by EdNews.

“That’s because a lot, a lot of work has happened,” Caldwell School District Community School coordinator Hortensia Hernandez told EdNews.

Idaho’s State Department of Education defines chronic absenteeism as missing 10% or more days of school. Attendance is a critical factor in improving student achievement, according to data from Attendance Works, a national nonprofit coalition.

In the 2022-2023 school year, Sacajawea educators addressed absences from day one. When the first absence occurred, officials sent an alert letter to parents. Repeated absences were met with interventions like phone calls from staff and weekly attendance meetings.

“Getting on the front edge of that curve makes all the difference in the world,” Sacajawea Elementary School principal Paul Webster said.

The goal for students is 95% attendance. Sacajawea, however, set the bar higher — 98% attendance (just one student absence or less). To incentivize classes accomplishing this goal, the school presented students with hard hats to show off their hard work, in addition to other incentives that instituted pride in a team accomplishment. As the program has gained momentum in the past five years, Hernandez has noticed the difference at Sacajawea, especially in the amount of kindergarten classrooms that hit 98%.

“Prior years, it was rare we’d ever see a kindergarten classroom meet that threshold. This (rise) is attributed to relationships not just with the kids, but with families,” Hernandez said.

Hernandez began as the Caldwell Community Schools coordinator in the summer of 2017, just after the district adopted the U.S. Department of Education campaign. National Community Schools grants fund student success drives by connecting to hyperlocal needs.

“Community Schools and attendance merge really well together. Attendance is a symptom of everything that we deal with through our community schoolwork,” Hernandez said.

Obstacles to success and attendance in Caldwell schools include access to basic necessities like clothes, housing, food, medical care, mental health counseling, physical fitness, transportation and childcare. Instability and poverty can lead to scattered school attendance and chronic absenteeism.

“It’s really a way of doing things that looks at the main barriers between our kids and their future success,” Webster said. “We look at the resources in our community in and around our school, and outside our school that can help the family and the kids overcome those barriers to be successful.”

Community Schools is a way to connect kids and working families to resources. Reducing burdens makes school attendance easier, establishes school as a place of shelter, helps create a safe space for parents and helps to alleviate chronic absences and poor attendance. At Sacajawea, these issues affect a large student segment.

“From a principal and from a teacher lens, you carry around like this list of kids that are gone too much,” Webster said. “You know that they’re probably not passing their classes, they’re probably struggling on their tests. And you wish they were there more.”

Webster figured there were around 30 Sacajawea students that were chronically absent. When the team pulled the data, however, that number was close to 100 — about a quarter of the school’s population at risk of falling behind critical foundational learning.

Beginning with chunks of 20 to 30 students at a time, staff reached out to families via email, phone calls and home visits. Sacajawea gathered together attendance clerks, counselors and teachers to not only address absences, but to offer support for families.

For Sacajawea leaders, empowering families is a process that involves all staff including classified employees. Bus drivers, for example, are encouraged to encourage kids scared to get on the bus, in part by doling out tokens that can be exchanged for treats and prizes for the ride.

“The best bus drivers interact with their kids,” Webster said.

For the upcoming school year, Hernandez is moving on to work as a Community Schools coordinator on a national level while Webster will move into her old role as Caldwell’s Community Schools coordinator to continue the districtwide push.

Also, this will be the first year that Sacajawea will track student mobility rates in real time — something that Idaho does not require, but Community Schools does. Mobility rates measure the number and percentage of students that enter or leave a school between the first and last of day school. Looking back, officials found that Sacajawea’s mobility rate was between 37% and 43%.

“It’s hard to afford housing in the Valley,” Webster said. “People are working two or three jobs, they’re going from place to place, staying with somebody temporarily, couch surfing, and end up going to somebody else.”

When families are in such flux, they can qualify as homeless, which allows the district to modify bussing routes to get them to school from Caldwell or Nampa. This is not a practical solution, however, when families are forced to moved as far out as Boise or Fruitland.

In an effort to at least keep track of these families, Caldwell connects parents with a community school liaison as soon as they register for school. And the school system will now be able to track mobility after adopting PowerSchool, a new content management system.

This may mean more hours required for school employees, but Webster believes that they are up for the task.

“We work hard to understand the factors or challenges underneath the attendance and to help families connect with resources or make a plan to overcome those barriers or challenges,” Webster said. “Attendance work is hard work, requires quite a few people and requires courage.”

Nichole Hall is ready to make a difference in education.

As she wraps her arms around a challenging job, Hall is relying on her years of collaborative, partnership-building experience to guide her first weeks as the new director of the Idaho Public Charter School Commission.

“We have an amazing staff here,” Hall said, adding that charter schools can expect to see them spending more time on campus, improving relationships and working on solutions.

The state agency has struggled recently balancing its advocacy role with its regulatory role — holding schools financially and academically accountable. Striking the correct balance is among Hall’s top priorities.

The IPCSC is the largest authorizer in the state with 62 charter schools; public school districts authorize 12 charter schools. The Legislature created the commission in 2004 to provide oversight. The commission’s seven board members are volunteers, appointed by the governor and the Legislature.

She comes with a desire to help charter schools succeed by building better relationships, not only with schools but also the Legislature and State Department of Education.

“My goal is to sit down with legislators and find out where their frustrations are so I can know how to move forward and provide support to schools,” Hall said.

Beginning as a middle school math teacher, she spent the last 17 years of her career in education. She served nine years for the SDE, as a coordinator in both the assessment and academics divisions. The last four years she worked for the Idaho Department of Labor, as the education program supervisor for the Idaho Job Corps grant, and then as the program director. 

She was interested in working with the charter community because they can develop expanded learning experiences for students: educational setting, curriculum, instructional practices and flexibility with scheduling.

“I am not knocking K-12 schools,” Hall said. “We all learn differently.”

“School districts work diligently to meet the needs of all their different learners but they have structural constraints. Charter schools have the ability to have expanded options in programmatic design,” she added.

Hall holds a master of arts in educational leadership and a master’s degree in mathematics education. Both her teaching and administrator licenses are current. 

Another of Hall’s priorities is to provide more training opportunities in the areas of business operations, facility contracts, funding sources, start-up processes, and compliance within the framework.

Idaho statute provides an accountability structure called the framework, which includes the indicators, measures and metrics used to evaluate each school’s performance outcomes. Each school is evaluated annually against the framework.

Hall was hired this month after the previous director, Jenn Thompson, resigned in protest following a series of controversial decisions. After leaving, Thompson took over as chief planning and policy officer for the Office of the State Board of Education.

The denial of a zoning permit in Fruitland has stopped Treasure Valley Classical Academy’s expansion plans and created uncertainty for the popular four-year-old charter school.

That decision was unexpected because the charter academy’s engineers and technical experts worked closely with city officials throughout the planning process, according to the school’s project documents.

A planning commission spokesperson said the charter academy can appeal with the city council or come back to them in August with a detailed plan that outlines how deficiencies will be fixed. However, waiting is not in the school’s best interest because their funding commitments also have an August deadline.

The Fruitland Planning and Zoning Commission voted unanimously on June 13 to deny a conditional use permit that would have paved the way for a new middle and high school, called the TVCA Upper Campus. Without the approval for expansion, they may not fulfill their charter performance certificate or commitment to parents who expect them to offer a full high school.

“It is vitally important that this succeeds,” said Stephen Lambert, executive director of American Classical Schools of Idaho and founding principal of TVCA.

Nichole Hall, the new Idaho Public Charter School Commission director, said her office will work to help TVCA and consider adjustments to the performance certificate, because “this situation is beyond their control.”

The Boise nonprofit Bluum, which helps develop charter school growth in Idaho, characterized this decision as a vote to limit school choice. 

“This action fundamentally takes away school choice for Fruitland and surrounding area families. The requested school use is conditionally allowed in the zone, but the commission denied the application without considering conditions that support the use in this location, or without suggesting steps that could be taken to permit the school,” Bluum said in a statement.

In its denial, the planning commission cited traffic issues, written and public testimony received, project costs and impact to the area, according to minutes from the meeting. One nearby business worried about losing its liquor license because of its 300-foot proximity to a school. Another business owner pointed out ongoing traffic problems on Northwest 16th Street that would only be exacerbated by more vehicles.

The school is planning to appeal to the city council, hoping to reverse the decision. A Fruitland spokesperson said Tuesday that an agenda for next month’s meetings — held on the second and fourth Monday — isn’t complete. So TVCA’s appeal will either be July 10 or July 24.

“If this does not work, then it will be a major disruption to about 300 students starting in August of 2024, because this school has been authorized to operate as a K-12 school and its success was predicated on that growth,” said Lambert.

In 2019, the school opened with grades K-6 and a PCSC-approved plan to add an additional grade each year, serving 702 students by 2025 as a full K-12 school. Next school year, they will add 10th grade. To learn more about the classical academy, use this link.

“Their parents have made the decision to send them to TVCA because they believe in American classical education, and they want the full K-12 experience,” the school said in a statement.

The estimated $7.5 million campus is planned for 8.62 acres under contract to purchase at the corner of North Arizona Avenue and Northwest 13th Street, southeast of St. Luke’s Clinic. The undeveloped land is zoned commercial and requires the permit for a school campus. 

The Upper Campus would include three new academic buildings, a gym and cafeteria, a bus parking cul-de-sac, a 150-vehicle parking lot and a soccer field. The new campus would serve grades 7-12.

All members of the planning commission voted to reject the permit request. The nine commissioners are appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the city council and serve four-year terms.

“I met with parent leaders this morning in fact, and the message to them is that we are taking the feedback seriously and that we’re going to come to the table with the city council with a plan that addresses the concerns,” Lambert said.

According to the minutes, the planning commission cited these issues as their reason for denial. 

• Northwest 11th Street needs to extend to Allen Avenue.
• More safe pedestrian and bicycle routes for kids.
• The lack of meeting the standards for a conditional use permit.
• The lack of funding for costs of road improvements.
• The burden on the city to fund improvements.
• Negative impact on commercial businesses in the commercial zone.
• An incomplete review from the Idaho Transportation Department.

The permit denial caught TVCA by surprise. In a TVCA statement, the charter academy said it worked closely with the city to identify the right property, develop a plan to build the campus, prepare an application in consultation with the city and address concerns about traffic.

The city had already agreed that a fair contribution for five intersection improvements “that are not the sole responsibility of the project” is about $150,000 of the $2.1 million cost for upgrades, according to project documents. But this issue is listed as a reason for denial by the planning commission.

“We are serious about addressing the concerns raised and we are continuing to follow the direction of the staff that we have coordinated with throughout the project,” Lambert added.

Editor’s note: Bluum and Idaho Education News are funded on grants from the J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Family Foundation. 

Policy 2050 prohibits classroom instruction on and discussions about gender identity, sexual orientation, transgender identity and gender expression. Conversations about these topics, according to the policy, should be left between a student and their parent or legal guardian. If a student wants to talk about gender identity or sexual orientation, they’ll be referred to a counselor, who will direct the conversation to the parent or guardian.

The policy also fulfills a law from the most recent legislative session, which requires students to use the bathroom, locker room or dressing facility that corresponds with their gender assigned at birth. That law goes into effect July 1.

Monday’s meeting extended into the late hours of the evening; public comment on the policy lasted just under an hour.

At least 10 district patrons spoke out against the policy, and at least nine patrons spoke in favor of it.

One opponent — a mother of a nonbinary student who attends Skyview High School — said the policy will “erase” her child. She’s concerned that under the new policy, her child will no longer be able to make art relating to LGBTQ+ themes in their art class, or talk about their gender identity openly at school.

Nampa patron Mindy OldenKamp said policy 2050 could exacerbate suicide rates, which are already higher among LGBTQ+ youth than other demographics. Other opponents said the policy would erode safe spaces for LGBTQ+ youth, and create opportunities for harassment and bullying by “othering” students.

“By not allowing the discussion of gender and orientation topics within schools, you’re no longer creating a safe environment for our kids,” said OldenKamp. “This quickly becomes a life and death issue for some.”

Many supporters said the new policy helps reinforce parental rights.

Some argued that the policy would work to prevent harassment and bullying based on gender identity or sexual orientation. Some alleged that their children are dealing with problems at school for being straight, white and cisgender.

Others said the policy would help educators get back to the basics: reading, writing and math. Two patrons, originally from California, commented that they moved to Nampa to get away from conversations about gender identity in the classroom.

“I’ve seen where this goes,” one man said.

Trustees deliberated the policy for about an hour.

Mandy Simpson, a Nampa trustee and Boise School District teacher, opposed the policy. She expressed concerns that the policy would make some students feel marginalized and unsafe.

“I know from firsthand experience, that if kids don’t feel safe in a classroom, they will not even begin to try to learn the reading, the writing, the math,” said Simpson.

Simpson agreed the Nampa district needs a policy that protects parental rights and provides guidelines around topics like gender identity and sexual orientation. But policy 2050, she said, would leave students and staff silenced.

Trustee Jeff Kirkman suggested that district staff make improvements to the policy to balance it equally for both sides. But later, Kirkman voted in favor of the policy.

Board chair Brook Taylor emphasized the importance of parents’ rights. In support of the policy, Taylor told the audience that she was voting yes because she recognizes the rights of parents to make their own decisions, and raise their kids with their own “core values.”

The board took a vote around 9:30 p.m.. Simpson was the only trustee to vote against the policy. Trustee Tracey Pearson was absent.

District superintendent Gregg Russell said the policy will give the district guidance.

“We need clarity in this district,” he said. “It’s not an easy thing to wrestle through…I know that is going to not be enough for some it’s going to be enough for others…I would like to have clarity so that when we go the next school year, our staff knows what to expect.”

Organized by the Idaho Historical Society’s “Guide, Engage, Mobilize” interns, the “Teen Takeover” this month opened “We the Teens,” the culminating exhibition after over six months of effort from 10 Treasure Valley participants.

Led by intern leader and museum education specialist Paige McCoy Niendorf, students from Boise, Kuna, Meridian, Caldwell and Middleton crafted an exhibit to educate their peers and the larger community about how the Gen Z generation coalesces to create communities and cultivate change in Idaho.

“We wanted to connect our own surroundings with Gen Z students in clubs across the world,” GEM intern MJ Gissell said. “Teens in Laos, North Africa, Bosnia.”

Gissell paired with fellow intern Abigail Jenkins on the “Connection” panel, one of four themed parts that make up “We the Teens.” Set to the left and just down the steps from the Idaho Historical Museum lobby, the exhibit collects together several display boards that all fall under subtopics of the overall theme of change and community – action, preservation, empowerment and support.

Beginning in November 2022, students developed months of guided activities and research, first figuring out their “Big Idea,” and then dividing it into sub-genres via “Know, Feel, Do” — what interns know about a topic, what they feel and what they want to do about it. “Connect,” for example, describes how the people in Idaho connect together and with the Gen-Z generation, a topic important enough to Jenkins, a graduated senior from Mountain View High School, that she put together an exhibition that aspires to illuminate.

“I wanted to shine a light on the minorities that are not always talked about or featured in Idaho,” Jenkins said.

Highlighted on a purple and orange background, the “Connect” placard describes and displays photos of Hispanic Latinx and LGBTQ+ people in the Gem State. There is also a graph that breaks down the rising identification of LGBTQ+ people over descending Idaho generations. This visual aspect was key for Jenkins’ inclusive perspective.

“A picture is worth a thousand words, right?” Jenkins said. “I wanted to show how these communities feel and express themselves. This helps express new attitudes in the state, the new residents who are here and helps these people to feel validated.”

This display and the larger GEM internship has helped Jenkins to solidify the decision to major in history and culture humanities when she begins at Boise State University in the fall.

“I love history and human creation. I love to see how much the past affects the present day. It’s so cool to see people’s interests as they spread throughout time,” Jenkins said.

Jenkins’ perspective describes one of the main goals of the GEM program: to build skills to prepare them for the future.

“Our focus isn’t only on growing the museum and history field, but to develop skills that will be helpful in any career moving forward,” McCoy said.

Tracking down local news stories about change makers and community impacts through local networks, breaking news, social media and interviews sharpened research skills. Drawing on their own experiences helped strengthen intrapersonal connection while working together developed team work, project management and interpersonal communication skills.

“I wanted to take the perspective of, ‘How would my friends feels when looking at this?’” senior Joanna Sanchez said.

The exhibit title is a riff on “We the People,” the theme of the upcoming 2026 “America 250” celebration from the American Association of State and Local History.

Constructing exhibits required practice and improvement of a number of key abilities, which students learned in concert with exhibit designer Bryan Rich and Nicole Inghilterra, curator of collections and exhibitions. Inghilterra taught interns how to gain permission to utilize artifacts like Chapstick, buttons and T-shirts for museum displays.

Display titles are blocked out in blue pen on torn cardboard — a nod to the organic, guerrilla nature of many movements and protests. The warm orange and purple display colors invite viewers in while offering a sly nod to Instagram, a social media app native to Gen Z kids. The white, readable font showed students how to use visual strategies to convey a clear message. And Inghilterra guided interns in writing exhibition descriptions — a very different type of exposition than academic work.

“The GEM cohort have never done this type of work before and may have only engaged with museums through field trips,” McCoy told EdNews. “With this background, it is always so impressive what these interns accomplish. They did an amazing job.”

Visitors can view the results at the Idaho State Museum through Monday, Sept. 11.

In 2019, a third-party report uncovered financial malpractice within the Boise charter, putting the school at risk of closure. But over the past three years, the school has operated on a balanced budget and improved most of its financial outcomes, according to a report given to the Idaho Public Charter School Commission Thursday.

But the school’s current building, located on Fairmeadow Dr. in Boise, is too large and too expensive for the charter to maintain, according to the report. The building was purchased in 2017, in hopes that the school’s student body population would grow to fill the space and pay off the facilities loan. But since 2019, the student population dropped by more than half.

In May, the charter board decided to exit its current loan — an option outlined in a December forbearance agreement between the VLA and its bank — and seek a smaller, more affordable building. The new facility is located on Goldstone Dr. in Meridian. The move could result in a boundaries shift for the school.